GREENFIELD — A bill making its way through the state House of Representatives that would allow drug addicts to turn over drugs to police when seeking treatment and avoid prosecution is drawing mixed reviews this week from different branches of law enforcement.
The bill, sponsored by Rep. Ann-Margaret Ferrante of Gloucester, would mandate that any person who enters a police station to turn over illegal drugs and “in good faith” seek help in obtaining treatment won’t be prosecuted for possession of the substance, based on a program started by the Gloucester Police Department last year.
But the state’s District Attorneys aren’t so keen on seeing that change. Northwestern District Attorney David Sullivan is among them.
Sullivan said Tuesday that he believes the Gloucester Police Department is doing a good thing that is helping save lives, but he thinks the House bill is poorly designed in its current form.
“It’s just not complete. It doesn’t handle all the variables that come with someone bringing drugs in,” he said.
That, he said, includes what actions would need to be taken if a person comes in to hand over drugs, but has other warrants out for their arrest. A mandate, critics say, doesn’t take the full scope of possible circumstances into account.
“You don’t know if they’re a user or a dealer, you don’t know the background,” he said. “They could be wanted on a number of drug dealing warrants.”
During a hearing on the bill before the Joint Committee on the Judiciary this week, Dr. Daniel Muse, a consultant to the Massachusetts District Attorney’s Association who argued against the bill, echoed some of Sullivan’s concerns, noting that such a law could raise concerns about entrapment or open police departments up to liability.
“We potentially create false expectations and even greater frustrations for those suffering from addiction,” he said. “As these efforts do increase, we run the risk of having many addendums to our present laws, which will result in inconsistencies and redundancies in policies.”
In a letter to the committee, Senate Minority Leader Bruce Tarr recommended changing the “shall not be charged” in the bill’s wording to a “may not be charged.”
Police testimony, including that of Gloucester Chief Leonard Campanello, said departments practicing their model haven’t run into those problems, and the Gloucester policy has seen more than 400 people enter treatment.
Still, Sullivan, a founder of the regional opioid task force, told The Recorder Tuesday that he thinks the better path would be to increase funding for hospitals and health care centers and pushing them to expand treatment options for addiction.
“We don’t want anyone not getting care, but why are we not pushing the hospitals and facilities on this? That’s why we have emergency rooms and social workers, they do it every day for every illness, why should drug addiction be any different?” he said. “They need to step up to the plate and own this crisis that they helped fuel,” he said, referring to problems with overprescription of powerful opioid painkillers.
“Police stations are not the first and best place for people to get treatment for their addiction,” Sullivan said. “They can go to the hospital and drop their drugs off at a secure drop off on the way.”
Sullivan noted that the state still faces a shortage of treatment beds for substance abuse patients. A detox facility is planned for the former Lunt Silversmith property in Greenfield, which Sullivan said is currently expected to open in late May.
“There aren’t enough treatment beds and intensive outpatient slots, so there’s another crisis there,” he said.
Without those wraparound services in place to help substance abusers maintain the recovery they may attain when they are sent out of state for treatment when they return home, Sullivan said, they’re exposed to an increased risk of relapse and overdose.
Additionally, Sullivan said giving police departments the option to give immunity — a decision he said traditionally lies within the domain of the prosecutor — would be granting a power that is too broad.
Sullivan said instituting programs like Gloucester’s in Franklin County would be difficult for department’s to achieve without the necessary resources and funding.
Greenfield Police Chief Robert Haigh Jr. agreed. He said his department simply doesn’t have the resources or personnel to adopt a program like Gloucester’s at this time, even if the bill were to pass.
“To deal with insurance companies, and reaching out, and having guaranteed places for people to go … Gloucester sounds like they have that in place and have made it a priority,” he said. “Right now, we don’t have that and we’re still working on getting (treatment) facilities into western Massachusetts.”
In Montague, Police Chief Chip Dodge said his department has already adopted a policy similar to Gloucester’s, but he, too, noted that the options for where to send an addict seeking treatment are limited in western Massachusetts.
“We’re looking forward to the (treatment center) in Greenfield, that’ll really help us,” he said. “But right now, if someone came in wanting to turn their drugs in, we’d honor that.”
To date, Dodge said the department has not had anyone come in to the department to turn drugs in, but has received plenty of calls from family members of addicts asking for help for someone they know.
“People ask me, ‘If I had a relative come in right now, where would I send them,’ and I’d essentially send them to Gloucester,” he said, noting that he’s been in contact with organizations specializing in addiction to try to find other options. “The Gloucester chief has extended an invitation to other departments to help them set up programs.”
Dodge agreed that the bill’s current mandatory language should probably be changed to a “may, but with a strong suggestion that you do.”
“Hopefully, our legislators can work to fix the wording of this bill to make angel programs work for those communities that choose either a health care or police model,” Sullivan added.
Material from the State House News Service was used for this story.