POLICE GET GRANT FOR DRUG CASES

Fort Myers Battling OxyContin Problem

Fort Myers Detective Kelly Witt could use the kind of help offered by
Purdue Pharma - the maker of the controversial painkiller OxyContin.

The pharmaceutical company awarded the Fort Myers Police Department a
$10,000 grant to be used for prescription drug investigations. The
city council is expected to approve the grant today.

Police plan to use the money for overtime on cases, drug buys that
target dealers and reverse stings that go after users. Fort Myers is
the third Florida police department to get the grant, according to
Purdue Pharma.

"It's nice to see drug companies taking responsibility and assisting
us with keeping their drugs lawful," Witt said.

Prescription drug investigations typically take more time to develop
than other drug cases, Witt said. "All prescriptions usually have a
lawful source," he said. "You have to research. ... At one point they
were diverted between the lawful source and the unlawful receiver."

Police arrested a man earlier this month after he filled 60
prescriptions - mostly for OxyContin and hydrocodone - for more than
1,700 pills at more than a dozen pharmacies throughout Lee County.

The next day, officers caught another man buying 200 OxyContin pills
for $2,000 from an undercover detective in a Fort Myers parking lot.

By chewing, snorting or shooting the OxyContin, abusers get a
morphine-like high, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement
Administration. A large dose can cause severe respiratory depression,
which can lead to death by slowing a person's breathing to dangerously
low levels.

Aaron Graham, a former DEA agent who now works for Purdue Pharma,
started looking at the issue of OxyContin abuse and law enforcement
resources two years ago.

"If you're going to pay for information and make undercover buys,
you're going to need money," he said, adding funding for prescription
drug investigations is usually pretty stretched.

In October 2002, Purdue Pharma started doling out the investigative
grant - $10,000 is the maximum amount - to police departments across
the country.

This year, the company plans to give out $1 million in
grants.

This is part of the company's efforts to combat prescription drug
abuse.

Some of the efforts include offering more than $2 million for a
statewide prescription database and providing tamper-resistant
prescription pads to physicians.

Janice Cook of Southwest Florida Addiction Services doesn't think the
$10,000 will go very far.

"It's a first step," she said.

She would rather see the manufacturer use the grants to educate more
people "before they become addicts," she said.