Police: Waste Disposal Facility Workers Smuggled Opioids Marked For Destruction To Drug Dealers
Follow CBSPHILLY Facebook | Twitter
BENSALEM, Pa. (CBS) -- Police in Bucks County seized hundreds of thousands of opioids with a street value of $1.2 million.
Officials say workers at a waste disposal facility were supposed to destroy the pharmaceutical medications marked for destruction. Instead, officials say the employees at the Wheelabrator Falls facility smuggled the pills to drug dealers in Philadelphia, Bucks County and New Jersey.
"Officer Schwartz was on patrol in Bensalem Township when he conducted a car stop. When he got close the car he smelled what was obvious to him as marijuana," said Fred Harran, director of public safety for Bensalem. "Officer Schwartz, knowing there was probably other illegal activity afoot, conducted further investigation. That investigation that evening led to 10,000 opioid pills in a local motel in Bensalem Township."
That wasn't all. Detectives traced the ten thousand opioid pills to a stash of 200,000 more. They also have a warning for other waste facilities.
"These half-dozen gentlemen from Bucks County aren't the brains of drug dealing all throughout the United States. I'm sure there's other folks who thought of the same plan and we really want to get this message out to make sure that companies that are watching this and companies that hear about this immediately change the way they are doing business and that these drugs get destroyed," said Fred Harran, director of public safety for Bensalem.
Police have arrested multiple suspects after several months of investigating.
Authorities say Wheelabrator Falls has changed its process of destroying drugs, adding a more stringent security process.
