Heroin Arrests On The Rise In Mentor, Lake County

When Mentor police arrested a woman for stealing a purse at Buffalo Wild Wings earlier this summer, she admitted to stealing it to buy heroin.

Police are finding these thefts, along with shoplifting and fraudulent returns, more common as heroin abuse becomes more prominent in the city.

“It’s easy money for heroin abusers to turn around and go buy their heroin,’ said Mentor Police Chief Kevin Knight.

Since 2008, Mentor police have arrested 44 people for heroin possession, but 20 of those arrests took place in 2012. Trafficking arrests also increased from three in 2008 to seven in 2012.

Heroin’s rise in popularity may be linked to a nationwide epidemic of prescription drug abuse. Police say heroin is both cheaper and easier to come by than pain pills like oxycodone, and is often used as a substitute by people hooked on prescription medication.

Heroin can be injected or snorted and has similar effects to pain pills.

“What makes it more attractive is it’s availability and price,” Knight said.

Pills cost $30 on the street, where users can score heroin for $15, he said.

Heroin Hotspot: Route 306

In Mentor, the area of Route 306 near Route 2 is a hotbed for drug activity, judging by the statistics. Eight of the city’s 16 trafficking arrests occurred there in the past five years.

Route 306 is a hot spot for drug activity because of all the motels and the close access to the freeway, Knight said

But what’s tricky about heroin is that “anybody and everybody is selling,” said Special Agent Dan Lajack of the Lake County Narcotics Agency. “We don’t even see cocaine anymore.”

Lajack said much of Lake County’s heroin comes from Cleveland, typically channeling through Wickliffe.

Mexico is the United States’ main source of heroin, where the drug is extracted from poppy flowers, which don’t grow in the U.S., Lajack said.

From Mexico, it is taken to Chicago and then Cleveland, where it gets dispersed throughout Lake County, he said.

High Profit, Hefty Punishment

Though dealers can make a lot of money from selling heroin, $180 a gram, they risk a felony arrest. Trafficking is a fourth or fifth degree felony depending on the amount someone is caught with, according to the Ohio Revised Code.

Set ups aren’t the only way police arrest dealers and abusers. In fact, most are discovered on routine traffic stops.

“We make traffic stops for suspensions and DUI that it’s not uncommon that when we’re inventorying these cars that we come across syringes and stuff like that,” Knight said. “When you become aggressive in your enforcement, you’re naturally going to come across more of it.”

Though usage and arrests are on the rise, Knight isn’t convinced that indicates a drug problem in Mentor. Instead, he attributes the increase in arrests to aggressive law enforcement.

“Every [city] has a heroin problem,” Knight said. “I don’t think we have a problem more than anybody else has, it’s just that we are being very aggressively proactive in attacking that problem.”

More in the series:

Prescription Drugs Gateway To Heroin Abuse In Lake County

‘The Point Of Desperation:’ From Rock Bottom To Recovery

5 Hints Your Loved One May Be A Heroin Addict

Desire To Quit First Step In Drug Addiction Recovery