By Sarah Mansheim
The Greenbrier County Grand Jury met this week, handing up 104 sealed drug indictments, and allowing law enforcement agencies to do a county-wide sweep of drug offenders on Tuesday night. Twenty-six arrest warrants were issued, and police were able to locate and arrest 21 individuals, said Greenbrier County Sheriff Jan Cahill.
Cahill said the warrants were the result of year-long investigations by the Greenbrier Valley Drug and Violent Crime Task Force. Most of the warrants were for the distribution of prescription opiates such as hydrocodone, morphine and oxycodone, said Cahill. There were some heroin and cocaine distribution arrests as well.
The sweep was county-wide, said Cahill. He indicated the drug crimes were evenly distributed throughout the county, with no particular area seeing more drug activity than another.
“There were no shortage of cases,” said Cahill, noting that one man was arrested during the sweep with a substantial amount of cash on hand, and a sizeable amount of opana hidden in his groin area.
“That’s not where your average law-abiding citizen keeps his medications,” said Cahill.
The Greenbrier County Sheriff’s Office was joined by the West Virginia State Police and all area municipal police departments to conduct the sweep, with the U.S. Marshall service, who provided vans to assist in the transport of the suspects to Southern Regional Jail.