BENTON — Prescription drugs are more frequently getting in the wrong hands — and in large quantities.
That’s why the Scott and Mississippi county sheriffs departments are teaming up to form a task force to address illegal usage of prescription pain pills.
“There’s definitely a problem,” said Scott County Sheriff Rick Walter. “Some call it the new meth.”
In the past two months, there have been seven or eight cases in Mississippi County dealing with illegal use of prescription drugs, said Sheriff Keith Moore. More cases have involved them in Scott County, too.
It’s an epidemic that affects a wide range of people — recent individuals have ranged from ages 14 to late 60s, Walter said.
And people do it for the high. “It just mellows you out,” said Dr. Richard Logan, a pharmacist who also serves as a captain with the Mississippi County Sheriff’s Department and a deputy for Scott County. He is helping to organize the task force.
Illegal prescription drug use is often done in combination with alcohol or other drugs.
“Just about every time that we go in and do something regarding drug activity, there are prescription drugs here,” Walter said.
Moore agreed. “In any of our meth cases and stuff like that, especially in traffic stops that we’ve made, there are always excess amounts of pills laid to the side in baggies — they’re never in bottles.”
And it’s a problem that’s been around for awhile. “Most people who see it would say ‘well, that’s not what we’re here for,’” Moore said.
“We don’t like to admit that we don’t know,” Walter said. “But we just aren’t educated.”
But the two sheriffs hope to change that for the region. By mid-October, they hope to have a course set up, which Logan will primarily instruct, to teach officers what to look for when it comes to fighting the prescription drug problem. They plan to have it certified with the Missouri Sheriff’s Association, so officers can receive credit.
Information will also be shared with the medical community.
“We don’t want to be here slamming the drug. They are good and people need this relief,” Walter said. “We’re not after the patients — we’re after the traffickers.”
What they want to do is just give medical providers information on what law enforcement is doing, what the laws are and how to contact officials if they sense something suspicious. “We’re trying to hit this from all sides,” Walter said.
They are also going educate the community. “We would like to make the public aware of what the problem is,” Walter said.
The availability of prescription painkillers makes them easy to steal, too. “Almost every household that you go into now a days has some type of medicine in there,” said Sgt. Greg Ourth, a Scott County detective.
Officials also stressed fighting these drugs will not take their focus away from other illegal substances. “We’re still concentrating on them and we’re going to continue concentrating on them,” Moore said.
There has been a slight rise of cases dealing with prescription drugs, because of increased usage and more attention, Moore said.
“I think it’s going to get to be even more of a problem, because it’s harder to get the necessary ingredients for meth,” Moore added.
Walter agreed. “Plus, prescription drugs are just really well-refined and potent,” he said. Whenever someone purchases them, they know what they are getting — which isn’t always the case with other controlled substances.
Logan said the pills, which are commonly opioids such as codeine, oxycodone and morphine, as well as central nervous system depressants and stimulants, “make heroin look like bottled water if you compare them on a milligram per milligram basis.”
Selling prescription drugs turns a big profit — usually about 90 percent, especially since pills can be purchased rather cheaply with insurance, Ourth said.
“You can make a lot of money off it,” he said. “Some people make more money per week on the street selling it than they were ever were able to make at a job working full time.”
There are also doctor shoppers, Logan said. He heard of a case where someone had been to 12 physicians and 15 pharmacies in a month’s period.
It’s a problem he’s seen for the 30 years that he has been in the pharmaceutical business.
Logan applauded the sheriffs for their foresight in tackling the issue.
“When you have two sheriffs get together to address a problem like this in a task force, you can tell it’s a pretty major deal,” he said.
They are ahead of the curve, Logan added. Other agencies say they don’t have the problem, but that’s just because “they don’t have their eyes open to it,” he said. “These two sheriffs are not that way — they’re proactive.”
