Heroin in black and white – Part 1 of 2
Oak Park has struggled for years – decades, in fact – to contain the effects of drug traffic at Austin Boulevard, the village’s eastern boundary with Chicago. That drug traffic is composed of violent gangs who have dominated street corners and buildings in the West Side Austin neighborhood, and multiple generations of white suburban drug users who come from miles away to purchase heroin.
Drug traffic brings with it increased local property crime, the threat of violence and danger to people at risk of being hit by drivers high on hard narcotics.
On the record, local officials estimate 70-80 percent of property crime is drug-related. Off the record, they suggest it may be over 90 percent.
Two of the most notorious drug locations in the village are in the area around Austin and Harrison, which is home to two gas stations adjacent to the on and off ramps of the Eisenhower Expressway. The other is the McDonald’s at 111 Madison, despite being located directly across the street from the Oak Park police station.
At least 27 people – all but one male, all but one white – were arrested for heroin possession in Oak Park in 2008. Numerous others were arrested for possession of paraphernalia, with others released when police could find no drug residue.
Things are far worse across Austin Boulevard. Chicago’s 15th District police arrested 50 people in the four days, Dec. 1-4, including eight for dealing heroin and crack. During December, there were 225 heroin or crack cocaine arrests in the 15th District, including 21 for dealing heroin, 91 for possession of heroin, 20 arrests for dealing crack, 77 for possession of crack, and the balance for paraphernalia, including one arrest in the 15th District Police Headquarters parking lot.
Call for a comprehensive strategy
River Forest Police Chief Frank Limon spent 30 years as a Chicago cop, retiring as head of the organized crime division. Between 2004 and 2008, he directed Chicago’s attack on gangs and drug traffic, working closely with state and federal law enforcement. He’s proud of their successes, but admits those successes have had some unwanted side effects.
“What we’ve seen is the strategies to combat the open-air drug markets in Chicago really started to shrink a lot of the real estate for the drug operations on the street,” said Limon. “As we shrink the real estate down, they consolidate their operations.” Gangs stopped warring over the colors of their clothing and turf and cooperated on marketing drugs.
“We’re seeing hybrids of gangs working together.”
Limon said that Chicago, and the West Side and Near West suburbs in particular, are victims of an urban geography that gives drug users easy access to the area via expressways.
“When you have a good location where you can sell drugs, you’re going to have people respond to that location,” he said.
Things are changing, however. In the face of efforts to suppress street-corner drug traffic, dealers have altered their tactics. Realizing a stationary target is a vulnerable one, dealers have counteracted police surveillance by moving their transaction sites around. And just as the police have learned to use high technology to catch drug dealers, dealers have learned to use technology to avoid detection.
“They’re using text messaging, the Internet, PDAs – things that weren’t used before,” said Limon.
Those altered tactics have brought a new and troubling development – arranged drug deals that take place in Oak Park, rather than in the city. Starting some time last May, according to observers, dealers started showing up in McDonald’s lot to deliver heroin to waiting customers.
“They deliver the drugs here now,” said one person who asked not to be named and who has witnessed many drug deals in the McDonald’s parking lot. According to this witness, the incidents “are escalating.”
“They usually jump in the car,” the observer said of the dealers. “They’re in and out in 10, 15 seconds.”
It’s not just at McDonald’s. On New Year’s Day, Det. Cmdr. Clemet Harbour said, patrol officers spotted Tomasz Tomczak, 23, of Streamwood talking on a pay phone at Austin and Harrison.
“We know that’s a high drug usage area,” noted Harbour, who said officers followed Tomczak’s car on Austin and west on Madison until he pulled into the gas station at Lombard and Madison. There a man later identified as Andreaco Rhetta walked up, talked with Tomczak briefly, and entered the passenger side of the car.
Police reportedly found 14 capsules of heroin in the car’s center console. Rhetta, 24, of the 100 block of N. Austin, Chicago, was charged with distribution of a controlled substance and Tomczak with felony possession of a controlled substance.
Understanding the motivations
Limon stressed the need to understand the mindset of those traveling up to 100 miles and taking serious risks.
“You’re looking at somebody who’s addicted; otherwise they wouldn’t travel into a violent neighborhood to purchase drugs,” he said. People like the dozen white suburbanites who have been arrested for drug possession in the McDonald’s lot since early November, including five people in three incidents over a 27-hour period.
“It’s safe to say they’re not thinking about their future, just immediate satisfaction,” said Limon. “They don’t see that they can end up in jail or prison – or dead.”
Some examples:
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The afternoon of Dec. 5, William E. Knight, 26, of Cary, was allegedly observed by police in a car in the rear of the McDonald’s lot with a spoon, a foil wrapper and a syringe loaded with brown liquid in his lap. A search reportedly turned up a packet of heroin on him and on his passenger Matthew W. Chavez, 25, of Fox River Grove. Chavez was wanted on a McHenry County warrant for violating probation on a burglary conviction.
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Nov. 4, Jay E. Gemkow, 29, of DeKalb was allegedly observed in the McDonald’s lot buying $400 of heroin. A search reportedly recovered a large clear bag containing a total of 51 foil packets of heroin. Police say Gemkow, a violinist, told them the heroin was all for his personal use.
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Gerald J. Bartz, 20, and Justin Dyrkacz, 20, both of Prospect Heights, and John Weber, 19, of Arlington Heights, were allegedly observed by police doing heroin in Bartz’s car in the McDonald’s lot the night of Friday, Jan. 9. Police say Dyrkacz, who was celebrating his 20th birthday, dropped a foil packet containing heroin to the ground as he got out of the car. A search of the car reportedly turned up 15 more packets of heroin and 12 hypodermic needles.
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Two days later, just after noon on Sunday, Jan. 11, a Schaumburg man and a Wheeling man were arrested in the McDonald’s lot just after they allegedly injected heroin in a car. As a reporter watched, responding police ordered the two out of the car at gunpoint as people waited in the drive-thru lane 20 feet away. Police cuffed and searched the two, but eventually released them when they could find no sign of the drug left in the car.
Business filling a demand
The drug trade is just that, a trade, with dealers providing a drug in return for the addicts’ cash.
“There’s a supply side and a demand side,” Limon said.
While addicts take risks for a fix, dealers take risks to make money. Such was the case in December when a black man in what a witness describes as a fancy blue Cadillac with 20-inch chrome rims pulled into the McDonald’s lot and made a transaction with two people the witness called “whites guys in their 40s.” Several days later, on Saturday, Jan. 3, the same two white men showed up. They were confronted by police, who searched them, to no avail. Ten minutes later, the dealer in the blue Caddy appeared. As he waited, police showed up and surrounded his car – or almost.
“They hadn’t blocked him off from the rear,” the source said. When the alleged dealer refused to roll down his window, one officer started to bang on the window with his gun.
“He was observed placing a clear plastic baggie containing smaller baggies up the sleeve of his jacket,” Harbour said.
After police again ordered him out of the car, the man put the car in reverse, did a three-point turn and took off.
“He …. drives across the sidewalk and the parkway grass at like 100 miles an hour, and flies up Taylor,” the witness recalled. Police pursued the man, who pulled into the alley in the 700 block of S. Taylor, abandoned his car and ran off. Harbour said officers saw the man pull bags from his sleeve and throw them away. He was chased through several yards and over fences before being apprehended on the 700 block of S. Lombard.
Officers recovered the discarded item, which contained 12 small baggies, each containing numerous packets of heroin, weighing a total 8.5 grams. Each featured a blue Superman logo, which Harbour said identifies the street gang marketing the drug.
Police have charged Larry Bady with possession of a controlled substance, and say they expect conspiracy-to-deliver charges will be approved by a grand jury.
Even if Bady goes to prison, things aren’t likely to change much.
“There’s always somebody who’s going to step up in that vacuum once we take down a drug operation,” Limon said.
It’s a vacuum created by persistent demand for what dealers have, and the willingness of users to give them what they want.
Limon said that while he’s 100 percent committed to drug enforcement, there can be no permanent solution without addressing the demand side. “We’re fighting the war on drugs against the sellers, but we need to fight aggressively against the demand side to have a real permanent effect,” he said.
After the Jan. 11 incident at McDonald’s, police placed a squad car near the south end of the parking lot. So far, it’s worked.
“We haven’t arrested anyone the past week,” Harbour said.