Discussing the first 6 months of 2023, the Owensboro Police Department and Daviess County Sheriff’s Office on Tuesday reported an increase in total drug charges and seizures compared to 2022’s year-to-date data.
Deputy Chief J.D. Winkler reported that through the end of June, OPD had seized more than 80 guns, 2 pounds of crack cocaine, 27 pounds of methamphetamine, nearly 300 ecstasy pills, 1.5 ounces of heroin, and over 16,300 pills of fentanyl. The department has obtained 15 federal-level indictments for large-scale traffickers.
Winkler said the stats correlate to the department’s strategy of tackling the suppliers rather than buyers. He said that while they do still arrest buyers and addicts, they would prefer to get directly at the source of the drugs being dispersed in the community.
“We can arrest a thousand addicts that are selling a gram or two to support their habit, and it’s not really going to accomplish much. We’re going to be chasing their tails and they’Il be out of the jail before the ink is dry on the citation,” Winkler said.
Winkler noted there’s been an increase in cocaine, but so far they haven’t been able to pinpoint a particular reason.
“There’s nothing that I can put my finger on with cocaine, but it could be a shift of trying something different. People see how deadly fentanyl is and the overdoses and are trying to switch to something different. And it could come down to the supply,” Winkler said.
DCSO similarly reported increases in seizures and arrests, largely due to the increased amount of detectives on the scene. Captain of Investigations Jeff Payne said that with the new administration the team grew from three to eight detectives, with three specifically focused on narcotics.
Payne said that through the end of June, they have seen 318 drug arrests — compared to 235 in that time frame for 2022.
“We’re attributing that to having more people on the streets, more detectives out there doing the job. I could break it down to the various drugs, but we’re seeing an overwhelming increase in all cases and I think a lot of it is because we’ve got a lot more doing the job,” Payne said.
Payne reported DCSO having a total of 80 arrests for marijuana-related charges, two for cocaine-related, 97 for methamphetamine-related, three for heroin-related, and two for opiate-related charges.
DCSO has also made 12 arrests for fentanyl-related charges — all for trafficking.
“Our goal is if there is a trafficker out there that’s who we’re going after,” Payne said. “We’re going for whoever’s trafficking, whatever they’re trafficking.”
