BERWICK, Maine — Despite a statewide ban on synthetic substances including the popular drug “bath salts,” Berwick law enforcement is experiencing a surge in bath salts calls and related crimes.
According to Berwick Detective Bill Russell, his department has seen an increase in bath salts calls and related crimes, despite the statewide emergency ban implemented recently by Gov. Paul LePage that made all synthetic hallucinogens illegal to sell, purchase, transport or ingest.
The ban, according to Russell, states the first offense under the ban is considered a Class D misdemeanor while further offenses are considered felony-level crimes.
Russell said the ban has helped to reduce bath salts calls for service. However, living on the border of a state where no such ban exists makes enforcement difficult, especially when an abutting community, Somersworth, N.H., is combating its own epidemic with the substances.
Russell estimates bath salts have become the No. 2 drug of choice in town behind prescription drugs because of direct calls for service and related crime calls.
In recent months, for example, Berwick has seen an increase in domestic violence and assault-related calls, said Russell, and some of those calls have been directly attributed to bath salts.
“It all goes hand in hand,” said Russell.
The first public arrest involving possession and consumption of bath salts in Berwick occurred in January 2012 when Joel Bennett, 27, of Berwick was charged with criminal trespassing and unlawful possession of synthetic or hallucinogenic drugs after walking into a resident’s garage uninvited and then attempting to hide bath salts underneath a nearby rock when confronted by police.
There is federal legislation in the works that, if passed, would ban close to 50 alternative bath salts ingredients. However, until that bill is passed and signed, law enforcement in communities with and without emergency bans can only focus on community awareness and enforcement in the way of local or state mandates.
Other Maine communities that border New Hampshire are not experiencing the same bath salts call volume as Berwick. Kittery, for example, a coastal town that borders Portsmouth, N.H., among other communities, has not seen an increase in bath salts-related calls.
In fact, according to Kittery Police Chief Paul Callaghan, there have been no known criminal cases of bath salts being ingested in Kittery.
Callaghan couldn’t answer why bath salts had made a minimal splash in Kittery.
Russell said while demographics may play a slight role between the disparity in bath salts-related crimes and calls in both Maine communities, Berwick has been facing more calls because of the convenience of not only bordering a state where the products are legal, but bordering a city where the products are or were being sold within feet of the state line.
“It’s convenient when it’s right across the border and Berwick is just one of the unfortunate agencies that has seen an increase in activity,” said Russell.
Russell said Berwick and Somersworth law enforcement agencies have met and discussed strategies for combating an issue they both agree is “a huge problem” in both areas.
Russell said both communities are “aggressively” working to take the products off the streets.
(c)2012 the Foster’s Daily Democrat (Dover, N.H.).
Visit the Foster’s Daily Democrat (Dover, N.H.) at www.fosters.com.
Distributed by MCT Information Services.
What is wrong with Maine that bath salts are such a problem there ?
Somehow I don’t see expanding “law enforcement” as any kind of viable long-term solution to the local issue LOCAL people have failed to identify, much less take the necessary steps to correct.
People just want to get stupid somehow someway. I always say good old vodka or coffee brandy will make you as stupid as you need to get. I don’t get it either. I wish we didn’t waste so much money babysitting the idiots though. Let them OD and the problem will go away.
The war on drugs continues to produce business for the courts, cops and corrections. The war is a welfare program and after 40 years a new plan is needed besides using war as the answer as it is the problem.
Doing the same thing over and over again the same way with an expectation that the outcome will be different is the sign of insanity.
Deal with these problems in a different way other than using war and endless taxation. Don’t act insane.
A link to a presentation from the Down East Emergency Medicine institute on
Bath Salts. History, Effects, Clinical Presentation and Treatment. For Police,
Fire, EMS, Physicians and nurses. Informational and free to share with
others
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAc6j0df4pE
Doc Bowie
Easy enough to solve these problems since it’s never going to end. The state is huge. Create a ‘high’ colony. Build huge walls and gates that don’t open. Allow people to seriously decide what they want to do. If they want to get high and ruin their lives, let them in. Once in they have to stay in, so they agree after some counselling. If they go in, fine. Drop seeds in and some farm animals. They have to agree to be sterile so no children are harmed. (OMG this is cracking me up). Drop in their high with their seeds. Make it interesting and tell them they can have pot seeds and watch how creative and weird things get. Like a high biosphere. Sounds nuts but I’m sure there’d be tons of people willing to leave their lives to live the ‘high’ life.
Sometimes I have to wonder if some people really are born stupid or if they have to study hard to get that way.