Local police: Drug crimes remain No. 1 problem

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July 10, 2012

Local police: Drug crimes remain No. 1 problem

By Mark Boshnack Staff Writer The Daily Star Tue Jul 10, 2012, 08:01 AM EDT

Drug-related crimes have been keeping many area police agencies busy during the first six months of the year, law enforcement officials said in reviewing the first half of the year Monday. While most did not have statistics available, they all discussed what they saw as recent trends.

The majority of the cases Otsego County District Attorney John Muehl has been seeing are drug-related, he said. This includes drug sales and possession, as well as burglary and larceny by those seeking to buy drugs. This is not a change, but has been constant the last few years, he said. Along with heroin, prescription and synthetic drugs are all part of the problem.

In talking with colleagues in surrounding counties: "Everyone is having a problem," Muehl said. "The demand seems to be more here because of the city and colleges."

Oneonta City Police Chief Dennis Nayor said drug crimes are hard to categorize because sometimes the numbers don't reflect the work being done. For instance, a lot of time goes into developing a case. The city recently averages a little more than four arrests a month for criminal possession of drugs. There are about 24 larcenies a month and 10 burglaries. Some of these might be drug-related, but he did not have enough information to speculate on that. The city had prepared public information handouts for the latter two crimes to make people more aware about what they can do to prevent them. This includes keeping car and house doors locked. "A lot of these types of crimes are opportunity-based," he said.

When college is in session, "We're dealing with mostly quality-of-life violations."

They include criminal mischief -- about 21 a month -- underage drinking, open-container law violations and public fighting, for which statistics were not available. Even during the summer, "there's not really any downtime in this profession," Nayor said. When schools are on break, it's an opportunity to catch up, he said.

State police at Sidney Capt. James Barnes said, "Drugs fuel a lot of criminal complaints." This often includes larcenies and burglaries. It's always been a problem, he said. The only change in recent activity has been in the use of bath salts, a synthetic drug.

Last year, there was only one case related to bath salts, but this year there have been six to 10 involving possession or people committing crimes under the influence. There were two recent incidents in nearby counties where people failed to comply with an officer because of the drug, he said.

Sidney Police Chief Michael Hood said year-to-date there were 945 complaints, about the same as last year. Arrests this year were 269 as compared to 221 for the same period in 2011. Most of the increases were for misdemeanors.

Although he did not have a breakdown for specific crimes, the largest increase appeared to be for larcenies. This included shoplifting, gas drive-offs and burglaries.

The economy, the village's recovery from last year's flooding and drug use could all be factors in the increase. Another area of increase is in computer crimes, including identity theft, and aggravated harassment through social media, he said.

"The good thing is we are solving the crimes and arresting people," Hood said.

Schoharie County Sheriff Anthony Desmond said his department lost a lot of records in last year's flooding, so he could not provide crime statistics. But related to that, there have been a number of burglaries because so many homes were left vacant following the floods. For instance, in the village of Middleburgh, there were many instances of homes that had copper pipes and other items stolen. His department has also dealt with a number of sexual abuse cases this year. "People are more aware of the issue and reporting it," he said.

In Delaware County, Undersheriff Craig DuMond said the sheriff's office has been busy dealing with numerous residential burglary complaints some related to the problem of heroin and prescription drugs in the area. Some recent arrests have been made, but "it always seems that someone is ready to step in and take the place of individuals we've apprehended."