Area drug crime cases fell in 2020
Pandemic likely factor, but experts don’t think drug use declined.
Local lawenforcement offifficials say they saw a decrease in felony-level drug crime cases in the pandemic- fifilled 2020, but health experts say they believe drug use hasn’t dropped and overdose deaths support that belief.
“After the number of indictments for felony drug cases had steadily increased over the past fewyears, we sawa drop in those cases this year,” Montgomery County ProsecutorMatHeck told the Dayton Daily News. “Time will tell if this is a temporary decrease due to the pandemic, or if there is some other reason for the decline.”
Daytonpolicealsoreported a decrease in arrests on drug possession and drug trafficking charges. In 2020, officers made 817 arrests in connection to drug possession and 49 arrests in connection to drug trafficking. That’s less than in 2019, when officers made 60 trafficking arrests and 956 possession arrests.
“Due to COVID-19, some types of police operations were modified for much of 2020, including some proactive patrol efforts. Whenpossible, we were able to continue addressing drug complaints in neighborhoods. We do encourage anyone with a complaint about potential drug use or sales in their area or neighborhood to call 937-333-COPS or Miami Valley Crime Stoppers at 937222-STOP,” Dayton police said in a statement.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Ohio drug abuse recovery groups throughout 2020 warned that the stresses of the pandemic, social justice unrestandother factorswere a formula for potential drug relapses.
“The disruption to daily life due to the COVID-19 pandemic has hit thosewith substanceusedisorderhard,” CDC Director Robert Redfield said in a statement. “As we continue the fight to end this pandemic, it’s important to not lose sight of different groups being affected in otherways. We need to take care of people suffering from unintended consequences.”
In Montgomery County, more than 300 people died from accidental drug overdoses -- more than 2019 and 2018. However, there were fewer accidental overdoses than in 2017 during the peak of the heroin epidemic.
Data from the Montgomery County Common Pleas Court specialized dockets, which handles some of the cases related to drug crimes, shows 124 new cases were referred to the court in 2020 as of the end of November. In 2019, more than 170 cases were referred to the specialized dockets, which include men’s drug court, women’s therapeutic court and veterans treatment court.
“We take referrals who meet certain criteria, such as higher risks and higher need cases,” Terra Bechtol, supervisor of specialized dockets said. “We typically do not take first-time felony offenders who have a limited treatment history, and recommend those cases for basic supervision. In the specialized dockets, we are primarily looking at multiple treatment attempts (completions and failures), those who need a more structured level of supervision and services, aswell as the severity of drug use.”
Bechtol said those referred todrugcourtundergoamore intense treatment plan and usually have to report to probation officers and the courtsmore often than other supervision options.
Andwhile there has been a decrease in felony-level drug indictments and referrals, Bechtol said 2020 provided new challenges as the courts worked to keep people on the path to recovery.
“We’re still holding people accountable, but we’ve hadtobemore creative,” she said. “Instead of the traditionalstructure, weincreased reporting, we needed to be careful that not asmany people are coming into theoffice at once.”
They had used a 24-hour or 48-hour jail sanction, but they did notwant to use the jail because of the pandemic.
“We had to be more creative, so we started to look at electronic monitoring, our reporting center, additional programming,” Bechtol said.
She also said it is unclear whythenumberofnewcases had dropped in 2020, but pointedtoshutdownscaused by COVID-19 as a possible reason. The Montgomery CountyCommonPleasCourts operated at a reduced level inMarch through June, and many cases have been continued because of the consequences of the pandemic.
The courts have since restarted, but not without changes. Anyonewho enters the courtroom must wear a mask and signs mandating masks and social distancing have been placed throughout the building. Plexiglass has been installed in the courtrooms as well to sitting areas isolated and air cleaning machineswere purchased to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
Bechtol said since June, the specialized courts have also been slowly getting back to a normal schedule, but are being cautious to ensure the safetyofbothstaffandclients.
“We’re trying to focus on those that are really strugglingandnot really putting so muchfocusonthosewhoare doingwellorareinrecovery,” she said. “We’vehadtoadjust thewaywe do business and theway the court does business. Before the pandemic, some of our dockets would be 50 people a week. And we obviously don’t want 50 people coming in at once.”
She said the drug courts have done a fewvirtual dockets and are bringing in people who need the constant structure.