By Attorney David Engler
In Jupiter, Florida the local Walgreen’s has been having a great couple of years. This means however that hundreds of mostly younger 20 to 40 year olds are hopelessly hooked on life ruining oxycodone. And when the Oxy’s run out or they can’t steal from Grandma’s prescription anymore then the next best cheapest high is heroin.
The DEA filed an affidavit that allowed for the search warrant at the Jupiter Walgreen last month. The Walgreens affidavit showed sharp increases in oxycodone purchases at each of the pharmacies under investigation in southern Florida. For example, a pharmacy in Fort Myers went from selling 95,800 units of oxycodone in 2009 to more than 2.1 million units in 2011 – good for 67 percent of all the oxycodone purchased by pharmacies in that same zip code in 2011.
Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/04/06/2735265/dea-searches-fla-walgreens-in.html#storylink=cpy
In the first two months of this year, the DEA added, 53 Walgreens pharmacies are listed in the agency’s top 100 purchasers of oxycodone. In 2009, none were on the list.
Earlier this year, the DEA released figures showing that Florida may be losing its distinction as the nation’s leading illicit source for painkillers because of the ongoing law enforcement crackdown and several new laws. Florida also last year began operating a prescription drug tracking system and database aimed at combating illegal diversion of the drugs.
The abuse of prescription drugs is epidemic in the country. This is a clear example of where there needs to be a national database so a doctor or law enforcement can type in a name to see if the patient has been pill shopping. Also warnings can be built into the system to show hot spots of pharmacy and pill mills that are complicit in this plague. 70% of all of my custody cases involve someone using opioids.
It started in Appalachia, caught fire in Tennessee, then Florida and now all states.
The guy that cleans your carpets may be taking from the medicine cabinet or maybe it is the grandson. $15 on the streets for one pill is a powerful motivator.
Attorney David Engler
Phone: 330-729-9777
http://www.DavidEngler.com Attorney Engler’s website
Areas of Practice: Family Law, Elder Law, Domestic Relations, Bankruptcy, Criminal Law
Also published on Family Fault Lines Blog http://familyfaultlines.com//
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