Local police detective: Drug dealers ‘play Russian roulette’ with users
Drug dealers are playing Russian roulette with clueless drug users in Walker County, according to one local detective captain. And he hopes the users stop participating.
Detective Dave Scroggins of the Rossville Police Department says that when illicit opioid drugs like heroin are cut with other more potent opioids like fentanyl or carfentanil, overdoses are inevitable because “if the two drugs are not mixed well one customer might get zero fentanyl (a drug that increases potency by
50 to 100 times that of heroin), while another customer might get enough fentanyl (it only takes a couple of grains to kill a person), to lead to an overdose.
God forbid if the illicit user gets carfentanil in the drug mix from their supplier, since that synthetic man-made opioid is 100 times stronger than fentanyl and a thousand times stronger than heroin. It only takes one grain of it to severely harm.
Additionally, any opioid taken by someone with a legitimate prescription, such as the opioid oxycodone, can also experience accidental overdose if they take more than prescribed or also take another opioid in addition to their prescription — whether it is legal or illicit, due to the potency of these products when combined.
That is why the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has made a concentrated effort to educate the public on this dangerous opioid medication, trying to prevent accidental overdoses by those using one or more legal opioid prescriptions.
Detective Scroggins says that this crackdown on the availability of legal and prescription opioids like hydrocodone, codeine and even legal combination opioids (acetaminophen-codeine, for example) is why the illicit opioid user is now turning to the more available (and less expensive to obtain) heroin that is hitting the streets.
“A lot of pain clinics have been closed and now legitimate doctors are no longer dispensing prescriptions for 120 opioid pills at one time to their patients, even if they are not drug users. Now, patients might get a prescription for just 10 of the pills at a time, with the ability to obtain another small quantity in 10 days, if needed,” Scroggins said.
Thus, this is limiting illicit access, too, since some drug users get pills from family or friends who do not use the pain medications prescribed to them due to cancer or other serious conditions, like orthopedic problems or surgeries.
This unavailability of legitimate access is leading opioid drug users to turn to street heroin as an alternative, according to Scroggins. But the detective says that this heroin hitting the streets now is often laced (mixed) with more potent illicit opioids, like man-made fentanyl and carfentanil, making the drug a deadly cocktail that he says is setting up users to unknowingly play Russian roulette each time they buy and use these drugs.
“They never know what they are getting in that buy,” the detective said, and he and his men are seeing the result of that, citing two overdose cases in one recent weekend.
In one instance, a young woman hired a taxi driver to take her to a local grocery store, but upon arrival the driver could not get her to exit the vehicle, opening the door to find her overdosed, with a needle lying next to her in the backseat.
In the other instance, a 30’ish-year-old male rode his bicycle to a female friend’s home and knocked on the door. When he was allowed inside, he started to walk down the hallway and fell face-forward, overdosing seconds after arriving.
Both cases are overdoses in a very small community in just one little corner of Walker County. And Scroggins says it isn’t the first time this year that opioid-related drug overdoses have occurred there.
In another case, a boyfriend and girlfriend are believed to have shared their legitimate prescriptions with one another (he methadone from a clinic; she a Xanax prescription). It is believed that the girlfriend took the methadone with the Xanax, which Scroggins says can be a toxic mix in the first place, and now the young woman is dead.
Methadone is a synthetic opioid and Xanax is a benzodiazepine, which enhances the effects of the opioid.
Opioid and benzodiazepine combinations, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, is a prescription combination that one study showed could be 10 times more deadly for the user than if they just used the opioid.
But not all overdoses are leading to death. Instead, in the wake of the CDC educating the public about the dangers of legally-prescribed opioids — and advising of the miraculous results of Narcan, the opioid overdose reversal drug naloxone — legitimate opioid users and illicit users alike are arming themselves with the nasal spray and injection drug for worst-case scenarios.
But for those who do not have such access, or who do not realize it is needed, emergency personnel stand between them and certain death. And that is where some statistical data can aid in the understanding of how bad the problem is becoming for Walker County.
Scroggins says that “for years past there was not more than a couple of heroin arrests made in our area, but that is changing. And not only are heroin-related arrests rising, but more overdoses are occurring due to opioid use — opioids laced with something, that is.”
According to data provided by Puckett EMS, the emergency services company used by Walker County, the miracle drug Narcan had to be administered by emergency personnel (to those who overdosed in North Georgia counties) as much as 188 times in 2018. It has been used 172 times already in North Georgia counties during the period Jan. 1 through July 31 in 2019.
In other words, of the 188 administrations of Narcan given to overdose patients in 2018 in North Georgia counties, 111 of those administrations (59%) were done in Walker County.
And, of the 172 administrations of Narcan thus far in 2019 (from Jan. 1 to July 31; just six months, not 12), 94 of those administrations (55%) were done in Walker County, too.
The stats show that Walker County has a growing overdose problem that Narcan is being used to treat. It is saving lives, but not all. And, in addition, it is not a proactive way to deal with a deadly problem that seems to continue to grow.
Scroggins states that while the statistics provided by the Walker County emergency personnel are a good indicator of the growing problem, those stats just give a partial picture since there could be many more drugrelated opioid overdoses that have occurred, but are not reported.
For example, individuals who have purchased their own Narcan kits from places like Walgreens and other pharmacies that sell them — and who, therefore, might not call for EMS assistance if they overdose on opioid drugs, will not be reflected in the Puckett EMS stats.
In addition, hospital emergency room statistics might show an even more alarming growth number of overdoses from opioid use (legal or illicit), too, Scroggins said, but those numbers might not be easily obtained or known outside the facility.
All of these statistics are concerning since the CDC recently stated that Georgia is one of 19 other states that have seen a “statistically significant drug overdose death rate increase from 2016 to 2017.”
Additionally, the CDC stated that “overdose deaths involving prescription opioids were five times higher in 2017 than in 1999.”
Unfortunately, as miraculous a drug as Narcan is proving to be, saving as many as 111 people in Walker County through its administration in 2018 and 94 others thus far in 2019, the miracle drug is not always able to save the overdosed individual.
Scroggins shares that one recent overdose individual in his jurisdiction had a Narcan nasal spray within their reach when they overdosed, but they never used it because they did not realize that they had already taken the illicit drug before accidentally taking it again, never realizing they had taken it twice.
Thus, the individual did not use the spray that could have saved their life. In that case, a piece of paper found at the scene revealed that fentanyl-laced heroin was present, and that made the double-dose even more of a threat of overdose.
In the battle of preventing opioid drug overdoses in Walker County and elsewhere, Detective Capt. Scroggins is not optimistic about the future, stating: “Where there is a demand there will be a supply.”
“For years past there was not more than a couple of heroin arrests made in our area, but that is changing. And not only are heroin-related arrests rising, but more overdoses are occurring due to opioid use — opioids laced with something, that is. Rossville Police Dept. Detective Dave Scroggins