DUPAGE KIDS TIED TO CITY DRUG BUYS

The letter from police to parents from Glen Ellyn to Naperville must
have been heart-stopping: Sometime this year, your car was used in a
West Side heroin deal.

As part of an ongoing sting aimed at stemming the tide of suburbanites
trekking to Chicago to buy drugs, police sent out 70 letters to the
owners of cars used in drug buys, police said Tuesday.

Some of the suspected buyers were DuPage County teens. In 40
instances, arrests were made.

DuPage County Sheriff John Zaruba said he was unaware of any fatal
heroin overdoses among DuPage County teens this year--and hopes the
July-October, multijurisdictional sting helped explain why.

"The word is out that law enforcement is out there taking down license
plates," Zaruba said. "If one of those letters saved a life, that's
all I care about."

The operation was launched last summer at the urging of Zaruba and
Naperville Police Chief David Dial, who became alarmed last year when
two youths died of heroin overdoses in Lisle and Naperville.

Dial and Zaruba--both members of the DuPage County Metropolitan
Enforcement Group, which oversaw the investigation--decided to target
the West Side with the Chicago Police Department's help after a
suspected dealer from the city was arrested in the suburbs with
heroin, Zaruba said.

"We went to the source to stop it on that end," he
said.

In July and August, DuPage County investigators and Chicago police
witnessed suspected drug deals in an area south of the Eisenhower
Expy., north of Roosevelt Road, east of Cicero Avenue and west of
Independence Blvd., said Mark Henry, director of the enforcement group.

They didn't make any arrests then, but took down the license plates of
about 30 vehicles from Naperville, Wheaton, Glen Ellyn and other
middle class DuPage County suburbs and sent warning letters to the
owners of the cars.

The initial stage of the investigation involved information-gathering
only. The second phase involved making arrests.

One Hanover Park man, who asked not to be identified, said his fiancee
received one such letter on Tuesday about a friend of the couple who
was leasing a car from them.

"He'd hit rock bottom twice on drugs, and I tried to help him," the
car's owner said. "Now I feel betrayed. I'm going over there to get my
car back."

In September and October, Chicago police posed as heroin dealers and
conducted three reverse stings in the neighborhood. About 40 DuPage
County residents, mostly adults, were among those arrested, Henry said.

Again, DuPage County authorities, who monitored the stings, sent
letters to the owners of the cars used in those deals.

"There are a lot of good people out there who don't know exactly what
someone is borrowing their vehicle for," he said. "We wanted to give
them a heads-up."

Philip Cline, commander of the Chicago police narcotics section, said
Chicago police were only too glad to cooperate with DuPage County
authorities by identifying drug-buying hot spots on the West Side
frequented by suburbanites.

"The customer buying drugs here is committing burglaries in the
suburbs to pay for the drugs," he said. "So it's a crime problem in
the suburbs, too."

Several parents wrote back to police, Henry said, "saying they were
unaware their cars were being used in the area and that they would
talk to their children."