Law enforcement agencies from Blair and neighboring counties executed another massive round-up of area drug dealers Friday, serving a total 68 warrants. By the time District Attorney Dave Gorman and Blair County Drug Task Force Agent Randy Feathers held there news conference at 11 a.m. Friday, 33 of those individuals has been apprehended, with the rest expected to be in custody by the end of the afternoon.
\nGorman noted that investigators made a total of 49 controlled buys of heroin, 40 of rock (crack) cocaine, 4 each of marijuana and powdered cocaine and 9 buys of prescription medications, including OxyContin. \u201cThe total amount of money used in the purchase of these illegal substances equaled around $15,000,\u201d he said. Gorman said that one search warrant had been executed at 1901 7th Avenue, Altoona, resulting in arrests and the confiscation of scales and cash alleged to have been used in drug dealing.
\n\u201cThere are no apparent connections between the individuals arrested,\u201d Gorman said when asked whether any organization had been uncovered. \u201cThough many of them probably had contact with one another on occasions, these were low level to street level dealers.\u201d
\nThose who were being arrested were processed at the United Fire Department and taken to District Justices in Tyrone, Altoona and Martinsburg for arraignment. If bail could then not be made, the suspects were taken to Blair County Prison.
\nOf those in custody was Kenneth Myers of Park Avenue, Tyrone. He was charged with one count of delivery of crack cocaine and one count of possession of crack cocaine.
\nFeathers said that law enforcement agencies, including canine units and special operations units, were utilized to orchestrate the massive operation. \u201cWe had some individuals with a history of violence and there was a potential for problems,\u201d he said. \u201cWe had an amazing amount of people coming in to do these raids and as big as these raids are, no one was hurt. It\u2019s a pat on the back for these people and their professionalism.\u201d
\nGorman noted that this latest drug sweep illustrates how costly it is to investigate drug dealing and he commended the people of the community for their support. He also thanked the State Attorney General\u2019s office for its funding and support in Blair County\u2019s fight against drugs.
\nWhen asked whether the recently proposed Drug Court would help alleviate the problem of repeat offenders, Gorman declined to speculate. \u201cI would like to see less repeat offenders,\u201d he said. \u201cBut all these individuals obviously won\u2019t seek the help they need and it comes down to the decisions they are going to make. We\u2019re still in the process of working out the details (of the drug court), so it is hard to speculate which individuals would be good candidates.\u201d
\nOver a dozen agencies and local police departments, including Tyrone, were involved in Friday\u2019s drug arrests.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Law enforcement agencies from Blair and neighboring counties executed another massive round-up of area drug dealers Friday, serving a total 68 warrants. By the time District Attorney Dave Gorman and Blair County Drug Task Force Agent Randy Feathers held there news conference at 11 a.m. Friday, 33 of those individuals has been apprehended, with the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-48188","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news-in-the-tyrone-pennsylvania-area"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48188","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=48188"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48188\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=48188"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=48188"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=48188"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}