Drug war escalates in Hoover

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Drug cases in Hoover were up 67 percent in 2017, according to statistics from the Hoover Police Department.

There were 972 drug cases in 2017, compared to 583 in 2016, stats show. Roughly two thirds of those cases were misdemeanors involving people possessing small amounts of marijuana or drug paraphernalia, but police also saw increases in felony drug crimes such as distribution and trafficking of controlled substances and possession of large amounts of marijuana.

Police Chief Nick Derzis said drug usage in society in general seems to be on the increase, but Hoover’s patrol officers are being more vigilant when making traffic stops and the narcotics unit has been diligent in making cases.

Derzis believes the increase in drug arrests has led to a decrease in other crimes such as robberies, kidnappings and property crimes such as motor vehicle thefts.

“There are very few property crimes that are done by people who are not drug addicts and, especially today, the majority of these people are heroin addicts,” he said. “If we’re putting some of those people in jail for drug crimes, maybe they can’t be out here burglarizingor robbing.”

He’s very proud of the city’s overall crime rate, which includes robbery rates that are the lowest in 18 years, he said.

Kidnappings, assaults, sex offenses and vehicle thefts also decreased in 2017, while shoplifting, firearms offenses and stolen property offenses increased, records show.

HOOVER DRUG OFFENSES 2016-17

KEY: red- 2017, grey- 2016

‘Outsider’ drug arrests

While the number of drug cases rose sharply in 2017, those numbers were not primarily driven by Hoover residents, Derzis said. 

“The majority of people that we’re arresting are not our residents. They’re outsiders,” he said.

Hoover police Capt. Gregg Rector concurred and said the drug arrests also serve as a deterrent for those people not to come back to Hoover.

“We know for a fact that people who are breaking into houses, people that are breaking into cars, people that are shoplifting, people that are forging checks — these people are drug users,” Rector said. “If we’re arresting them for some other charge, then there has to be some deterrent effect.”

Marijuana is the most common drug found on people, accounting for 37 percent of all drug offenses in Hoover. That doesn’t include marijuana paraphernalia, such as rolling papers or pipes.

With an increasing number of states legalizing marijuana use, there are a lot of recreational users out there, Derzis said.

“They don’t see any reason why they can’t be driving around smoking pot,” he said. “The reason you can’t is because it’s against the law here.”

Plenty of people argue that marijuana is not a gateway drug to other drug usage, but Rector disagrees.

“Everybody who tries marijuana is obviously not going to become a heroin addict, but every single heroin addict we’ve ever talked to … every single one of them started out by using alcohol and marijuana,” Rector said. “To me, that’s proof that marijuana is a gateway drug. Every person that winds up on a hard-core drug, somewhere on their path, they used alcohol and marijuana and maybe graduated to pills and so forth.”

HOOVER CRIME STATISTICS 2016-17

KEY: red- 2017, grey- 2016

Heroin epidemic

The next biggest drug problem in Hoover is heroin, Derzis said. The city continues to see a lot of people overdosing on heroin, he said. The number of overdose incidents in Hoover, which usually involve heroin or fentanyl, increased from 17 in 2011 to 64 in 2016. The overdoses that resulted in death climbed from five a year to 12 a year in that time frame, police statistics show. 

The numbers fell slightly to 57 overdoses and 11 deaths in 2017, but it’s still a significant problem, Derzis said.

“Thank God for Narcan,” the chief said, referencing the nasal spray used in emergency treatment of opioid overdose patients. It has saved a lot of lives, he said.

What’s astonishing to him is the grip that heroin gains on people, he said. Once users get their hands on it, they frequently get so excited about it that they inject themselves almost immediately, he said.

“People can’t wait to get where they’re going. They’re going to stick themselves with it while they’re driving and end up in an overdose situation,” Derzis said. “I don’t think any of us that have been in police work 30 years have seen anything that takes hold like this has. It’s not just here. It’s every city in America.”

HOOVER DRUG OVERDOSES

KEY: orange- # of incidents, red- # of death

Searchingfor solutions

Hoover police continue to work with other agencies to think outside the box about how to tackle the opioid epidemic that is sweeping the nation, Derzis said. “We can’t just go around and arrest everybody that’s doing heroin,” he said. “It’s a drug that once it takes hold, it’s not an easy thing to fix. There are a lot of people that have been in rehab several times for heroin.”

Hoover police are partnering with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration to combat it and working with other law enforcement agencies and school officials on drug prevention efforts to keep young people from ever getting started using drugs in the first place, he said.

“I don’t think we have the answer yet,” Derzis said. “If we had the answer, we’d be rich.”

The third most common drug found in Hoover is crystal methamphetamine, a stimulant drug, Rector said. Whatis found in Hoover is not the “shake and bake” homemade meth that is made in a bottle. 

“This is meth that’s coming into the United States in bricks and kilos,” he said.

Hoover police are seeing a little increase in meth but nothing drastic, he said.

While most of the drug cases are being made by patrol officers, Hoover’s four-person drug unit also has been active with undercover buys and drug stings, Rector said. The number of drug distribution cases increased from 10 in 2016 to 38 in 2017, and the number of trafficking cases – involving larger amounts of drugs – increased from five to 10.

“Our target is not to arrest a bunch of heroin addicts. That’s not going to accomplish a whole lot for us,” Rector said. Police will arrest people with small amounts of drugs, but “our target is the people selling and moving large amounts of this.

“If we had a 12-person unit, we could do three times as much as we’re doing now,” Rector said. “There’s an endless supply of targets out there, but there’s only so much manpower available and only so much time in the day to target those people, but we keep chipping away.”

Other crimes

Drug use often is related to other crimes because people will steal to fund their drug habits, so police say they are not surprised to see a 15 percent increase in shoplifting in 2017, from 825 cases to 952. Stolen property offenses, such as receiving stolen property, rose 55 percent, from 42 cases to 65, and weapons violations rose from 63 to 81.

But Derzis and Rector both said they were amazed to see the number of robberies in Hoover decline from 41 in 2016 to 35 in 2017. Rector said he thought Hoover’s robbery numbers had bottomed out in 2016.

Of those 35 robberies, only five were robberies of a business, and nine were shoplifting cases that turned into robberies because the thief struggled with someone and used force to take something, Derzis said.

Hoover police cleared 63 percent of the city’s robberies, which is double the national average, Lt. Keith Czeskleba said. That means they either made an arrest in those cases or determined them to be unfounded, he said.

Vehicle thefts also declined in 2017 from 102 to 85 — a 17 percent drop. That’s less than two per week. Most vehicle thefts in Hoover occur at people’s homes, not in shopping areas, Czeskleba said. Historically, the most common vehicles stolen in Hoover are General Motors pickup trucks, Rector said.

Domestic violence cases were down 16 percent in 2017, and other domestic incident calls were down 12 percent. Rector said it would be nice to take credit for that, but he really has no explanation for the decreases in those incidents, which are difficult to control.

There were three homicides in Hoover in 2017, which is consistent with recent years, police said.

In June, 21-year-old Ledarious Jaquad Peterson was charged with murder after police said he attacked his 26-year-old roommate, Shunoah Seantel Turner, with a hammer and killed him at The Renaissance at Galleria apartments.

Then in September, 2-year-old Levi Ellise Pointer died of blunt force trauma at The Retreat at Rocky Ridge apartments. Her mother’s 19-year-old boyfriend, Dlonata Khalil Melton, was charged with murder and later indicted in January of this year.

Police said the third homicide occurred at the Elevation Hoover apartment complex in December, when 18-year-old Tyric Toodle was shot to death. Police said Toodle and two accomplices were trying to rob a drug dealer when Toodle was shot in self-defense. His two accomplices, identified as 18-year-old Isaiah Flowers and a 15-year-old boy, were charged with murder.