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FacebookPrescription drug ring foiled, police say
Riverside police say they bought the drugs in undercover operation; indictments of trafficking and possession to be sought.
Saturday, May 19, 2007
RIVERSIDE — Riverside police may have busted up a prescription drug ring and given a couple of baby boomers and a senior citizen a few more gray hairs in the process.
Police said they bought drugs from a 48-year-old woman and a 74-year-old man in an undercover operation, after being introduced by a 51-year-old woman.
Extras
Commander John Burke of the Warren County Drug Force said it's impossible to predict who gets involved with drugs, at what age or why.
"It's like anything else, there's a whole gamut of reasons," Burke said. "Certainly prescription drug abuse is more prolific than it was in the past and older people have more access to these kinds of prescriptions. It's supply and demand. Those pills are worth more money than they were 20-30 years ago."
The trio has not been arrested but police said they will seek indictments of drug trafficking and possession against them.
Riverside Detective Tom Donahue said after complaints about drug activity at a home on Valley Street, officers started an investigation in March using undercover officers. A female resident of the Valley Street home allegedly helped set up deals to purchase prescription drugs from the 48-year-old and 74-year-old man, both of Huber Heights. Police said they purchased Vicodin from the duo three times.
Sgt. David Crigler said the elderly male suspect is a retired engineer with two masters degrees who told police he'd "fallen in with the wrong crowd."
Police said the Huber Heights woman told them she acted as go-between on deals where the man didn't know the buyer. She said the man had "accidentally" discovered dealing later in life because he'd been making small loans to acquaintances and taking their pills as collateral.
Police seized the man's vehicle, $1,423 in cash and 144 prescription pills, among them Vicodin, Percocet, Klonopin and Xanax.
"I think it's still the sixties catching up with us," Donahue said. "In this case, at least one of them was selling prescription drugs to buy illegal drugs, literally going from prescription in hand to pharmacy to selling."
