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Warren cops have busy weekend of seizing crack pipes, drugs, saving overdose victims
By Ed Runyan
WARREN
Warren police had a busy weekend of arresting people for having crack pipes, a symptom Trumbull County Mental Health and Recovery Board Director April Caraway says might be indicative of the cocaine-fentanyl mixtures killing people.
A Warren police officer revived two people using the opiate reversal drug naloxone Friday night on Fifth Street Southwest after they became unresponsive, apparently from a drug overdose. It’s not known what drug or drugs they may have taken.
They were charged with child endangering because they were responsible for three children at the time.
But in three incidents, police reported finding crack pipes, which Caraway says are a method of smoking a deadly combination of cocaine and fentanyl.
Toxicology results for 2018 Trumbull County overdose deaths through Sept. 29 show that the largest drug combination found in the victim’s blood was fentanyl and cocaine at 25 percent. Fentanyl alone accounted for 17 percent, while the combination of fentanyl, cocaine and prescription drugs made up 6 percent.
“People are smoking crack and not realizing they have fentanyl in the crack, and it’s fentanyl causing overdoses,” Caraway said.
Shawna Barnes, 23, of Fifth Street Southwest and Kyle D. Ozanich, 21, of Cranberry Lane pleaded not guilty Monday in Warren Municipal Court to child endangering after they apparently overdosed Friday in Barnes’ apartment on Fifth Street Southwest with children age 4, 2 and 6 months present.
Police were called at 9:30 p.m. and found Barnes and Ozanich unresponsive. An officer administered two doses of naloxone to Ozanich and one to Barnes, and they were taken to St. Joseph Warren Hospital.
The mother of two of the children told police Barnes is her sister and was baby-sitting for her. Bond of $3,500 was set for Barnes. Ozanich was ordered held at the jail without bond.
At 9:50 p.m. Sunday, police made a traffic stop on Woodland Street Northeast in which Clinton E. Drake, 55, of Haymaker Avenue Northwest was charged with possessing drug paraphernalia for having two glass crack pipes in his shoe and carrying a concealed weapon, reports say. Not-guilty pleas were entered, and bond of $1,500 was set.
Joshua M. White, 31, of Kenilworth Avenue Southeast pleaded not guilty to possessing drug-abuse instruments and drug paraphernalia after a traffic stop on Willard Avenue Southeast at 9:29 p.m. Saturday during which police found two glass crack pipes, one of which contained what White said was crack cocaine.
Police also found hypodermic needles and a metal spoon with a brown, dried substance on it in the center console, reports say. White also could face a drug-possession charge depending on the results of a lab test of the rock substance.