Police chief says drug busts help target crimes
By Ed Runyan
WARREN
The city’s police chief says drug busts such as the one his street crimes unit carried out Thursday on Deerfield Avenue Southwest are an important part of the department’s efforts to target types of crime that lead to violence.
Warren had no narcotics unit for three years, but Chief Eric Merkel created the street crimes unit last fall shortly after he became chief to proactively address drug dealing and other problems in the city.
“I would say a large amount of our homicides and violent crime are drug-related,” Merkel said Friday, after Traver D. Williams, 36, was arraigned in Warren Municipal Court on three felony charges related to Thursday’s raid.
Not-guilty pleas were entered for him to two counts of drug possession and one count of being a felon in possession of a firearm. He was released after posting $3,500 bond. Williams has been charged through the court 34 times dating back to 1996, including several charges relating to drugs and weapons.
Police seized $30,700 in cash, an ounce of suspected crack cocaine, a quarter ounce of suspected heroin, three handguns and 10 digital scales. The street crimes unit focused on Williams’ home at 1508 Deerfield for three months because of reports of drug activity, Merkel said.
Williams was arrested along with two men who arrived there during the raid. Dalshawn Bell, 21, of Cranwood Drive and Leroy Wright, 49, of Vernon Avenue Northwest were arrested on outstanding warrants.
Some of the headlines in recent years have highlighted the influx to Warren of men from Detroit and other cities dealing drugs and getting into gunfights, such as Detroit native Derrick Peete.
Peete was convicted of murder earlier this year and sentenced to a prison.
Warren will need to continue to combat drug dealing even if the threat of out-of-towners continues to decline from 2012 levels, Merkel said.
He thinks the street crimes unit, the almost-daily presence of the U.S. Marshals Service, federal prosecutions and the work of the Ohio Attorney General’s Safe Neighborhoods Initiative that began in December have taken away some of the allure of coming to Warren to deal drugs.
“As a drug dealer, I don’t know why you would come down here,” Merkel said. “We’re seeing a drug- search warrant about every two weeks. It’s only a matter of time till we get to you,” he said. “We’re a small town. We know who the people are.”
The Safe Neighborhoods Initiative involved singling out 14 men identified as being a threat to commit gun violence and having a talk with them at the Trumbull County Courthouse, as well as offering them help to change their lifestyle.
Merkel said he thinks the program has reduced shootings in Warren and will continue to pay off as a new group of men is “called in” to the courthouse in November.
Bob Fiatal, an assistant state attorney general who is part of the program, also is speaking to local men who are about to leave prison so they know about the Safe Neighborhoods program, Merkel added.