Shorewood's War on Drugs

Last Thursday, the Shorewood Citizens’ Police Academy class and I had the opportunity to test marijuana and cocaine.

Not in that sense; we used NarcoPouch test kits to verify that the substance we suspected of being an illicit drug was in fact an illegal substance.

Lt. Paul Sullivan, a 27-year veteran of the Shorewood Police Department and drug recognition expert, spoke about illegal drugs ranging from the date rape drug GHB to synthetic drugs like K2. 

It’s a well-known fact that drugs are a huge problem across the nation. That’s probably an understatement. Sullivan said data collected in 2000 shows there are 2.5 million abusers of drugs nationwide, with pain pills causing more deaths than heroin and cocaine combined.

But, it’s probably not as well known that drugs are very prevalent in our little square-mile village.

Sgt. Jeff Schmidt, who typically runs the class, said it’s a problem many turn a blind eye to.

"It's a problem many don't want to acknowledge,” he said.

Heroin is the drug of choice here in Shorewood, and along with abuse of the narcotic, come overdoses. There have been several overdoses in Shorewood over the past several years.

, where a Milwaukee man walking with his girlfriend on the Oak Leaf Trail did heroin and overdosed.

Schmidt said when police and emergency personnel arrived at the scene, the man wasn’t breathing and his body was blue.

EMTs used this drug commonly known as Narcan that brought the man back to life. Schmidt said once the man became lucid, he was livid they had ruined his high.

William Feerick, co-owner of a prominent funeral home on East Capitol Drive, was after police responded to his Shorewood home for a report of a drug overdose. Feerick said he was trying to conduct an intervention on a then 22-year-old Muskego man. Emergency personnel were able to bring the Muskego man out of a drug-induced comma.

A Shorewood police officer was recognized for saving a man's life in 2009, after he pulled over to check out a suspicious vehicle and found a man unresponsive in the driver's side. The man had overdosed on heroin, but was brought back when given a Narcan injection.

And, two men were found dead in a Shorewood apartment a few years ago. Their bodies were found several days after they had overdosed on heroin. Schmidt said police and fire personnel had to wear masks to enter the apartment because of the overwhelming smell of rotting flesh, and when they entered they went to pull up a shade on a window, but vomited in their masks after realizing it was hundreds of flies covering the window.

Of course, Shorewood police acknowledged there are other drugs in Shorewood, but heroin is the most prevalent.

Prescription pills, especially the highly addictive Oxycodone, are on the rise, not just nationally, but locally.

Shorewood police were part of an investigation that . Fraudulent prescriptions were being passed at area pharmacies, including and for the popular drug.

The world of drugs is a scary one and Shorewood police are right in the thick of it.