Kure Beach And Carolina Beach Police Arrest Prescription Drug Dealer
By WILLARD KILLOUGH III
Managing Editor
KURE BEACH - Narcotics Detectives from the Kure Beach and Carolina Beach Police Departments are working together to battle drug dealers on Pleasure Island. Managing Editor
According to the Kure Beach Police Department, on February 11, 2011, Narcotics Detectives from both departments arrested 52-year-old Parnell Crittenden of Wilmington, NC on five counts of trafficking in opium.
According to detectives, after a yearlong investigation, they served a search warrant on Crittenden's home at 2305 Waverly Drive in Wilmington and found over 800 units of opiate derivatives.
According to a press release issued by the Kure Beach Police Department, "Detectives believe Mr. Crittenden was responsible for 40 to 50 percent of the illegal prescription narcotics being provided to Pleasure Island."
Crittenden was scheduled for a grand jury hearing in Wilmington on February 21.
According to police, prescription narcotics have climbed to the top of their radar. The illegal sale of prescription medication has become one of the top problems facing law enforcement nationwide. The problem is there is an endless supply of prescription medications and street level drug dealers have taken advantage of it.
Prescription medications are virtually odorless and much easier to conceal than traditional narcotics, making law enforcement's job much more difficult.
According to a release issued Monday, "Depending on the type of medication, some are being sold for as much as $40.00 per pill. With a standard thirty-day supply of ninety pills, a drug dealer is looking at $3,600.00 per prescription. However, it is not uncommon for detectives to find prescriptions written for much higher quantities. Most recently, detectives found a prescription that had been filled for 970 Oxycodone HCL 40mg as a three month supply to a single patient."
Detectives say the illegal sale of prescription medications is affecting all walks of life and they've had cases involving teenagers all the way up to senior citizens.
According to the release, "We have seen that younger adults and teens involved in the prescription drug trade are doing it as a means to make fast easy money. Whereas some older adults who have no medical insurance or have recently lost their
insurance do it as a means to make enough money to have their necessary prescriptions filled."
Police say whatever the reason, the public needs to be aware that the penalties for illegal selling of prescription medications are high and lawmakers are taking notice of this new trend.
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, the threat posed by the diversion and abuse of Controlled Prescription Drugs (CPDs) is increasing, largely aided by rapidly increasing distribution of the most addictive CPDs, prescription opioids. According to the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), the amount of prescription opioids distributed to retail registrants increased 52 percent from 2003 through 2007.
Opioid pain relievers are popular among drug abusers because of the euphoria they induce. Opioid pain relievers include codeine, fentanyl (Duragesic, Actiq), hydromorphone (Dilaudid), meperidine (Demerol, which is prescribed less often because of its side effects), morphine
(MS Contin), oxycodone (OxyContin), pentazocine (Talwin), dextropropoxyphene (Darvon), methadone (Dolophine), and hydrocodone combinations (Vicodin, Lortab, and Lorcet).
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that a high percentage of people who die from a prescription opioid poisoning have a history of substance abuse and that many have more than one CPD in their system at the time of death. For example, a 2008 CDC study found that 82.3 percent of diversion-related unintentional overdose decedents in West Virginia in 2006 had a history of substance abuse and that 79.3 percent had used multiple substances that contributed to their deaths.
In many instances, these individuals were simply using prescription opioids (either singularly or in combination with other CPDs, alcohol, or illicit drugs) to achieve a heroin-like euphoria, and many did not have a legitimate prescription for the drugs.
For example, the CDC study found that 63.1 percent of all unintentional CPD overdose deaths in West Virginia in 2006 involved individuals who did not have prescriptions for the drugs that contributed to their deaths. Sources of prescription medications diverted to street level dealers are unscrupulous physicians writing bogus prescriptions as well as ordering from online pharmacies.
More specifically, methods of diversion include:
• Pharmaceuticals manufactured lawfully, but stolen during distribution
• Medications obtained inappropriately from legitimate end-users, (e.g., friends share prescription drugs, family members leave medicine in easily accessible places, etc.)
• Fraudulent prescriptions written on prescribing pads that have been stolen from medical offices
• “Doctor shopping” is a method where individuals see several doctors in an attempt to obtain multiple prescriptions without revealing what they are doing. Often these individuals will have their prescriptions filled at several different pharmacies to avoid detection.
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