Starting in March, Frankfort police officers will investigate all non-fatal and fatal overdoses as crime scenes in an increased effort to identify and build strong criminals cases against dealers.According to Police Chief Troy Bacon, “Working with our narcotics and criminal investigators and the Clinton County Prosecutor’s Office, we have developed an overdose response guideline for officers and detectives to follow when they respond to a non-fatal or fatal drug overdose. We will be treating every scene as a potential crime scene and investigating it accordingly.”
Last year, police officers responded to 57 overdoses with Naloxone administered 24 times.
The new guidelines require responding officers and detectives to treat every incident as a medical scene first. Then, if the overdose is believed to be caused by an opiate, officers will administer Naloxone and treat the situation as a potential crime scene where evidence and statements will be collected to hopefully guide detectives to the dealer.
“Until now, we have not had the personnel or resources in the Narcotics Division to be able to investigate overdoses to the degree we would like. Our ultimate goal is to identify the dealers and develop strong criminal cases resulting in successful prosecutions,” Bacon said.
Police officers remind everyone they can submit an anonymous drug or crime tip by texting
TIP FRANKFORTPD followed by the message to 888777.