Camera Purchases Good Use Of Funds

The Bristol Virginia Police Department has decided on an excellent use of money forfeited by a drug manufacturer convicted of falsely promoting OxyContin. The city used more than $70,000 to buy 14 digital video cameras for city police cars.

The money came from Commonwealth Attorney Jerry Wolfe’s office as its share of money for assisting in a federal prosecution of Purdue Pharma in 2007. Company officials pleaded guilty in May 2007 in federal court in Abingdon to misbranding the highly addictive painkiller OxyContin. The drug company and three of its former top executives paid $634.5 million to resolve criminal and civil charges.

OxyContin became known as “Hillbilly Heroin” for its highly addictive nature and popularity in the Appalachian region. This opiate derivative was commonly prescribed for chronic pain, but could be abused by being crushed and snorted or injected. Nearly 400 deaths, many in Southwest Virginia, are attributed to OxyContin overdoses.

The cameras will give officers high-quality video that is easily archived and recovered, so it will make for strong evidence in court.

According to Wolfe, $1.34 million of that money was funneled from the federal government to his office for the assistance it provided during the investigation and subsequent trial.

“The feds contacted my office after it was all over with and said, ‘We’re gonna share one half of 1 percent of this for loaning us one of your assistants while we were doing this,” Wolfe told News Channel 11, the Herald Courier’s television partner.

The cameras are the first major purchase with the money, which must be spent on law enforcement.

The department had six digital cameras installed in patrol cars and two others that record to tape. The new equipment means all but two patrol officers will have an in-car video system.

OxyContin has wreaked untold damage on families that can offer poignant testimony of its addictive qualities. Law enforcement has had added demands to respond to OxyContin, including the prescription drug fraud, drug dealing and associated crimes such as theft, robbery and prostitution. It is a perfect solution to put this money into police car video cameras to keep the public, and police officers, safer.