Hamilton County working to stop the selling, distribution of heroin
HAMILTON COUNTY, Ind. (WISH) — “We can’t arrest our way out of the problem, but we have to manage the drug market,” said Major Aaron Dietz, division commander for Hamilton and Boone County Drug Task Force.
Dietz said his agency is working to stop the selling and distribution of illegal drugs.
“That’s my frustration is how we could get people start stopping?” said Dietz.
But time after time, Dietz said they’re running into the same problem dealing with repeat drug offenders like Chad Dinkins and David Vu.
According to court documents, police arrested the men on separate occasions in 2014 and 2015.
“Of all the arrests we made last year,” said Dietz, “69 percent of all the arrests were repeat offenders.”
Court documents stated in 2015 both were caught after traffic violations.
Vu is charged for possession of paraphernalia. His court date is set for Feb. 5. Meanwhile, Dinkins took a plea deal, pleading guilty to dealing heroin.
Dietz told 24-Hour News it is frustrating to see when suspects accept plea deals and some of the charges are dropped. However, he will continue to work with the Hamilton County Prosecutor’s Office to make sure repeat offenders face the consequences.
“You could see where they repeat, they continue to re-offend,” said Dietz. “That’s what we’re dealing with, the drug dealers will continue to sale, the users will continue to use.”
In 2015, the Hamilton and Boone County Drug Task Force worked on 32 heroin cases and made 36 arrests. Dietz said that number is slightly down from 2014 where they had 42 cases.
“The cases were bigger and it involved more people, but less overall number as far as cases,” said Dietz.
One of the cases he’s referring to is an operation called “This And That.”
It happened last September when federal, state, and local law enforcement broke up what they called a violent heroin trafficking organization in Indianapolis.
Dietz said they were able to stop the move of thousands of dollars worth of drugs.
“The focus was that we wanted to do everything we could to stem the flow of heroin into our counties and we worked for years on that,” said Dietz. “But this was a unique opportunity. A very unique pipeline, a very large source that we had an opportunity to stop that source that would effect on a bigger scale so that’s how we got involved and it was a tremendous effort.”
But no matter how big or small of an operation, Dietz said his work is far from being done.
“We’re back at it this year. We’re going to keep at it and people who are involved in heroin are going to keep coming,” said Dietz.
The Hamilton County Drug Task Force is already investigating several heroin cases. Dietz said for the first time since 2008, the task force received a $15,000 grant to help them with future undercover operations.
