Despite an ongoing blitz of arrests and raids – including a recent one where 87 individuals were served warrants for drug activity – largely relating to heroin, U.S. Attorney William Ihlenfeld II said that there continues to be an increase in the number of deaths related to heroin overdoses in West Virginia.

 

“I would say that heroin is still the number one threat we face in law enforcement … Deaths from prescription pill overdoses is still number one in that category, but heroin continues to move up,” attorney for the Northern District of West Virginia said.

 

Although he says arrests, investigations aggressive work will continue, he said the fact the problem continues in the face of more work than ever on the drug problem by his office and others in law enforcement has led to some new tactics likely to be unveiled this coming week.

 

“We’re going to do more on the prevention and treatment side of things. We’ve got some neat tools that we’re hopefully going to roll out next week, which is the plan,” said Ihlenfeld. “We’re trying to put it all together.”

 

Ihlenfeld said the new programs are necessary, if for no other reason that he doesn’t see the problem – particularly with heroin – going away anytime soon. In fact, he said it could get worse based on projections relating to heroin production.

 

“The projection we have is that heroin production will be going up in Mexico in 2016 and 2017,” said Ihlenfeld. “That means we’re going to see more of it here. Most of it goes northeast … This is where the market is for heroin in the United States. As a result, we have to be more creative and more proactive on the prevention and treatment side of things.”

 

As for the July 28 drug operation that had its staging area in Bridgeport, Ihlenfeld said the work on that is still in its infancy stages. However, he said he thinks it was a success.

 

“We did gather more information and there’s always possibility that it will lead to additional arrests. It was a very successful operation where we executed warrants and brought 87 people into the criminal justice system, but here’s still a lot of work to be done,” he said. “You’ll continue to see operations like that, maybe not with 87 individuals involved, but they’ll be substantial and likely with a lot of people arrested.”

 

The recent raid involved primarily low level drug dealers and middle men, Ihlenfeld said. Information gathered from them will help law enforcement not only go up the chain, but allow local groups work with areas where the heroin and other drugs are coming from.

 

“Along with the new programs, we have to be more focused than ever before on out-of-town and out-of-state drug trafficking organizations. For example, Detroit, Michigan is a major problem for North Central West Virginia and for other parts of our state,” Ihlenfeld said. “We’re going to try and focus a little bit more on that part of the country by not only targeting traffickers from that area, but working with our law enforcement officers in Michigan to feed them intelligence on cases that we’ve investigated here in Clarksburg, Bridgeport, Morgantown and Fairmont.”

 

Detroit is just one of many trouble spots. The U.S. Attorney pointed to Columbus, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia and even Baltimore as cities providing drugs to our area and the Mountain State. He said Detroit, however, feeds drugs to West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois.

 

“Leaders from those states, U.S. Attorneys and FBI and DEA leaders are going to get together in the very near future to talk about how we can better address the flow from Detroit southward,” said Ihlenfeld. “It’s a very real issue.”

 

As for the new programs that may roll out this week, it’s a positive benefit of a negative designation for Harrison County. In September of 2014, Harrison County was given a HIDTA (High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area) designation by the federal government. While that means there is a significant drug issue, it allows for funding and resources to be acquired to handle it.

 

The fact we have a HIDTA designation in Harrison County really helps us to do some of these additional things,” said Ihlenfeld. “It brings extra dollars in to this situation not just for enforcement, but for prevention and treatment.”

 

Ihlenfeld and others are probably open to any additional resources. During the July press conference announcing the raid, he said his offices case load is shifting upward on those that are focused on drugs. Ihlenfeld said that data he saw from 2013 and 2014 had roughly 55 percent of cases prosecuted from his office as drug cases. He added that the total was now likely closer to 60 percent.

 

“I don’t know if that’s utilizing all of our resources … but it’s a lot,” he said at the July conference. 

 

Editor's Note: Top photo is of U.S. Attorney William "Bill" Ihlenfeld during the July press conference where 87 warrants were served during one raid, while an ATF officer is shown at the staging area for the raid at the Bridgeport Recreation Complex. Bottom photo, from 2013, is another raid that took place as part of the ongoing battle against drugs in the area.