Pubdate: Fri, 09 Sep 2005 Source: Parkersburg News, The (WV) Copyright: 2005, The Parkersburg News Contact: http://www.newsandsentinel.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1648 Author: Roger Adkins NARCOTICS TASK FORCE OPERATES FOR 20 YEARS PARKERSBURG - For the past 20 years, the task of combating organized drug trafficking and other illegal activity has fallen upon the shoulders of the Parkersburg Narcotics Task Force. After 20 years of investigating crimes of every variety, the task force has accumulated a storied history. Through the years, PNTF agents have faced investigations involving illegal gambling as well as all types of narcotics trafficking, including cocaine, crack, heroin, marijuana, LSD and methamphetamine. From humble beginnings as a loosely organized, informal vice squad, the task force grew into a highly structured, federally backed unit that continues to be the bane of area drug traffickers, founding members said. Steve Greiner was Wood County sheriff when the task force was formed; he was elected sheriff again years later and was able to see the task force as a highly evolved unit. Now retired, he said he remembers the humble beginnings of the task force. "When we first started, we had a little secret office in an old house trailer that was donated by one of the local salvage yards. We didn't have a lot of equipment, but we had a lot of knowledge and dedication from all the local law enforcement. Over the years it has just grown into a well organized group," Greiner said. "Another thing I was always proud of from all the officers from all agencies was for the first several years, we had a 100 percent conviction rate." The task force dates back to 1985, when then Parkersburg police Chief John J. Norton organized a Special Investigations Unit in response to three gambling-related shootings that occurred in one year, said current Parkersburg police Chief Robert Newell, who, as a young detective, was a founding member of the unit that later became the PNTF. "In the fall of 1984, a local gambler was shot and robbed in a bungled contract hit. A couple of months later, another shooting occurred at an establishment on Sixth Street near Market Street. These incidents, and a gambling related shooting on Seventh Street the previous year, prompted Chief Norton to concentrate on gambling," Newell said. Norton announced that a Special Investigations Unit had been developed to coincide with President Ronald Reagan's War on Drugs campaign. Newell was assigned to head the unit because he was involved in two of the three shooting cases and multiple gambling investigations in the 1970s and 1980s. Veteran Officers Steve Plum and Gerald Board also were assigned to the unit. From the start, the city officers worked with Trooper K.O Adkins of the West Virginia State Police and Detective A. Bruce Schuck of the Wood County Sheriff's Department, establishing an informal multi-agency group that would later become a more structured task force, Newell said. "Back then, it was just a group of experienced investigators from different agencies who put their heads together and found they had similar information," Newell said. "The first five years were very informal. There were no federal grants, no equipment." In that first year, the unit investigated four murders and conducted vice operations, all of which resulted in arrests and convictions. At the same time, agents, with help from the FBI and IRS Criminal Investigation Division, conducted raids at gambling joints in the city. These investigations resulted in dozens of arrests and the confiscation of money and gambling devices that were illegal at that time, Newell said. The end of 1985 saw cocaine emerge on the Parkersburg scene; the problem escalated to near epidemic proportions, Newell said. This scene would be repeated in 2000 when methamphetamine emerged. The cocaine trade was lucrative, with ounces upon ounces available from several criminal organizations and rampant interstate trafficking. Facing an uphill battle, the PNTF sought the help of the DEA. Special Agent Jeff Sandy of the IRS CID and Special Agents John Bryan and Tim Ely of the local FBI office also joined the group, which was then given the name by which it is known today. During the next several months, agents purchased nearly $100,000 worth of cocaine; sometimes they bought as much as four ounces in one evening, Newell said. Officers identified three groups operating in the area, including one that was smuggling cocaine from Florida in fire extinguishers and distributing the drugs from a video store. The investigations took officers to Ohio, Florida, Michigan and Texas. A total of 51 people were arrested; all were convicted in federal court. Sentences ranged from six months for some to 30 years in prison for the heads of the conspiracy. On the heels of this investigation came a multi-million dollar marijuana operation in Wood and Washington counties, Newell and Sandy said. Roughly $1 million worth of marijuana a year during a five-year period was being cultivated in the area and shipped to Chicago. About six defendants were arrested and convicted in federal court. "They were trading high-grade marijuana for cocaine from Peru," Sandy said. While investigating the trafficking of a new drug, crack cocaine, task force agents continued to investigate federal gambling violations and related crimes. On Super Bowl Sunday 1988, 21 federal search warrants were served in Parkersburg on known gambling establishments, resulting in more than 12 arrests for violation of interstate commerce laws, racketeering and bankruptcy fraud, Newell and Sandy said. These cases also resulted in convictions in federal court and forefeiture of money and property. A similar investigation was conducted by the PNTF with the cooperation of the Marietta Police Department in Marietta the following year. Several establishments were closed as search warrants were served and arrests made there as well, Newell said. The task force became a formal entity in 1991, when federal funding was made available by Criminal Justice Services. An agreement was reached among Parkersburg police, Vienna police, the sheriff's office, the state police and the Wood County prosecuting attorney's office, Newell said. Since then, the task force has handled numerous investigations involving all types of drug activity, but none of the illegal substances was more dangerous to agents than methamphetamine. By late 2000, this new enterprise escalated to drug trafficking levels similar to the cocaine epidemic the task force faced in the 1980s, officials said. There was a new twist, however. Task force agents were faced with drug dealers who manufactured their own products in clandestine labs using dangerous combinations of household chemicals. The chemicals and methods used in the manufacturing process are toxic, flammable and explosive if handled improperly. Current members of the task force had to become cross-trained as lab technicians and tactical entry teams, Newell and Sandy said. At the height of the methamphetamine problem, nearly 200 labs were seized by the task force. Newell said 100 of those labs were seized within one year. The meth problem appeared to have no end until local task force agents uncovered and helped shut down the major source for the chemicals associated with meth at a warehouse in Columbus, he said. "During the past year, powdered cocaine has again surfaced as a popular drug in this area," Newell said. "This problem, coupled with emerging gang activity in the Parkersburg area, will certainly justify the existence of a multi-agency task force well into the future. The task force continues to be effective despite an expanding area to cover." In the last year, Parkersburg police added an officer to the task force and another Parkersburg officer has been assigned full time to the DEA. This cooperative effort with the DEA has allowed the Charleston office to assign the Parkersburg officer and a DEA agent to the task force, increasing jurisdiction and resources, Newell said. - --- MAP posted-by: Elizabeth Wehrman