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Families, teams hurting from suspected drug-related deaths of 2023 Heritage, Bunn grads
A pair of recent Triangle-area high school graduates who were friends linked through their love of baseball died over the weekend.
Two young men who were friends and shared a love of baseball died over the weekend, devastating families and teammates.
Wilson Moore, a 2023 graduate of Heritage High, and Jacob Cope, who graduated from Bunn High in 2023, both passed away on Saturday.
Both Moore and Cope played on a travel baseball team and their respective high school teams before graduating. The two met through work and developed a friendship. The sudden nature of their deaths shocked and saddened friends and family in recent days.
Moore’s GoFundMe said the family suspects Moore died from “accidental substance poisoning.” Cope, 18, also has a GoFundMe to support his family.
Rolesville police are investigating. A toxicology report has not been finalized.
Continue reading “Families, teams hurting from suspected drug-related deaths of 2023 Heritage, Bunn grads”Fentanyl victims advocacy group holds educational, networking event in Lexington
LEXINGTON, N.C. —
A group of people who lost family members to fentanyl held an educational advocacy and networking event in Lexington.
On Saturday, the group “Fentvic” came together to start safety conversations within the community about the dangers of illicit fentanyl.
The group said they want to focus on counterfeit pressed pills, like Adderall, Xanax, and Percocet, as well as the access of life-saving naloxone in schools and the community.
Participants at the event had the option to bring posters of their family members to honor their loved ones they have lost to fentanyl abuse.
CDC data has ranked North Carolina 4th in the nation in fentanyl-related deaths last year. North Carolina data also shows a combined 2,615 fentanyl deaths between 2013 and Sept. 2023.
For more information on Fentvic and to see any of their upcoming events throughout North Carolina, visit their website here.
Read the full article and watch the video on the WXII News 12 website.
Davidson County families work to fight fentanyl together
DAVIDSON COUNTY, N.C. (WGHP) — Eight people in North Carolina die every day, because of fentanyl, according to the North Carolina Office of Chief Medical Examiner.
On Saturday, people who have lost someone to the deadly drug met other families, public officials, health advocates and law enforcement in Davidson County to work together to fight the fentanyl crisis.
“We want to educate people on this,” said Mike Loomis, a founder of Race Against Drugs.
Mike and his wife, Lorie started Race Against Drugs to be a support for families, after they lost their son, James. “You can’t get over something like that, it complete changes your life and we don’t want another parent to lose their child to drugs laced with fentanyl,” Lorie said.
Continue reading “Davidson County families work to fight fentanyl together”‘We’re tired of telling parents that their children are dead due to fentanyl use’ | UCSO works to fight fentanyl crisis
Union County is working to get fentanyl test results back sooner.
MONROE, N.C. — WCNC Charlotte is putting a face to the fentanyl crisis.
Recent trends show it’s killing people who don’t even know they’re taking it.
A deadly dose is as small as the size of Abraham Lincoln’s cheek on a penny.
Now, the Union County Sheriff’s Office is working to crack down on the drug, which is greatly impacting families.
“He just really had a special heart,” Union County resident Linda Hibbets said.
Hibbets, raised her grandson, 18-year-old Brian Terrano. He grew up loving adventures, sports, and anything to do with Gatlinburg. After a trip there, the next morning he was supposed to go to school.
“I told my husband to help me get him off the bed, and I did CPR, I’m an RN, and I couldn’t save my grandson and that was really hard,” Hibbets said. “I’ve saved others, but I couldn’t save him, he was gone.”
It’s a story UCSO Lieutenant James Maye has heard too often.
Continue reading “‘We’re tired of telling parents that their children are dead due to fentanyl use’ | UCSO works to fight fentanyl crisis”INSIDE LOOK: Union County crime lab’s crucial role in putting criminals behind bars quicker
UNION COUNTY, N.C. — Union County is working to speed up justice with its crime lab and newly accredited FIELDS of evidence, which means faster results while putting criminals behind bars and getting innocent people out.
Channel 9′s Hannah Goetz spoke with forensic chemists, crime scene investigators, and law enforcement officers on Thursday about the work they are doing, which is helping to cut back on the state lab’s backlog.
The digital forensic lab has equipment used to analyze things, such as text messages, which could lead to an arrest.
“It’s key for us to create a timeline of that victim’s last hours and this room does a great job of providing us that,” said Lt. James Maye.
The work in the digital forensic lab can help in cases of fentanyl poisoning to identify drug dealers.
“This evidence is used to determine which source provided the narcotics that ended the life of a victim,” Maye said.
The crime lab’s most recent accreditation was in the fall of 2023, which allowed officials to process fingerprints and blood alcohol testing on-site.
The blood alcohol analysis, which could be crucial in a DWI arrest, starts there where vials are filled and prepped for testing.
“The alcohol that’s in the blood will slowly go into the air above the sample,” said forensic chemist, Dayla Rich.
“So, you test not the blood, but the air that is coming out of it?” Goetz asked.
“Correct,” said Rich.
Running those tests in-house can provide results weeks or even months faster. Other local law enforcement agencies can use the lab too.
“Sheriff (Eddie) Cathey is encouraging everyone to bring us your phones, your blood, anything we can do to get criminals off the street bring it to us we’ll take care of it,” said Lt. Maye.
In the coming months, they’re hoping to be accredited in other fields of evidence analysis, including DNA, blood drug toxicology, and seized drugs.
The lab will not conduct autopsies on-site. That will be the responsibility of the regional medical examiner’s office.
The Union County Sheriff’s Office hopes to eventually do postmortem-blood-drug testing for death by distribution cases.
Read the full article and watch the video on the WSOC TV9 website.
NC State sophomore raises money to provide free Narcan to students
Sophomore Alyssa Price said she lost two friends to overdoses, and now she’s raising funds to provide free Narcan to students.
An NC State student is raising funds to help fight overdoses on campus.
Sophomore Alyssa Price said she lost two friends to overdoses, so she wanted to do something to help save others.
That’s why she is raising funds to provide Narcan – a medicine that reverses opioid overdose – free to students.
The university has increased resources after 14 students deaths, including two fatal overdoses, during the 2022-23 school year.
Price said this is one area where she felt she could do more.
“They created a bunch of preventative measures last year,” Price said. “But we did not have the part that was, ‘What if it happened?'”
She said she’s trying to help students be more prepared – and proactive – in the case of an emergency.
NC State prevention services does provide free Narcan kits to any campus community member – upon request. The university said it has distributed 744 kits throughout the past two years.
Price started a GofundMe to help raise money for her free Narcan initiative.
Read the full article and watch the video on the WRAL website.
‘No person that is safe’: Families continue the fight against fentanyl during victim summit
MONROE, N.C. (QUEEN CITY NEWS) — The Fentanyl Victims Network met Saturday morning to continue the fight against the deadly drug taking over the nation.
Families who lost loved ones in the fentanyl poisoning shared their stories and pictures in hopes of uplifting each other.
Debbie Dalton was one of them.
“There is no demographic; there is no person that is safe from this evil that is taking our children,” said Dalton.
In 2016, she lost her son Hunter to the drug after she said a good friend offered it to him.
“Hunter joked about it, like, ‘I don’t do this. I’m 23.’ He laughed about it. But unbeknownst to Hunter and his good friend, it was cut with fentanyl, and it gave my 6’2″ son a heart attack. He didn’t stand a chance against it. He was so strong that he survived for six days, and I held his hand, but he never regained consciousness,” Dalton said.
In his memory, she started the Hunter Dalton HD Life Foundation. Her mission now is to spare other families from going through the same heartache.
North Carolina is fourth in the nation in fentanyl deaths, but only 10th in population. Between September 2013 and September 2023, over 1600 people died from the drug in Gaston, Mecklenburg, and Union counties.
Continue reading “‘No person that is safe’: Families continue the fight against fentanyl during victim summit”Jelly Roll urges Congress to pass anti-fentanyl trafficking legislation: “It is time for us to be proactive”
Rapper-turned-country singer Jelly Roll spoke about the importance of prioritizing the fentanyl crisis at a Senate hearing on Thursday.
The musician, whose real name is Jason DeFord, testified before the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee, chaired by Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio.
Jelly Roll urged Congress to pass Brown’s Fentanyl Eradication and Narcotics Deterrence (FEND) Off Fentanyl Act, which would wield financial sanctions against drug traffickers to disrupt the flow of opioids coming in from China and Mexico.
Jelly Roll, who from the age of 14 spent 10 years in and out of detention facilities for drug dealing and other crimes, said he was part of the problem but now wants to be part of the solution.
“I brought my community down. I hurt people,” he testified. “I was the uneducated man in the kitchen playing chemists with drugs I knew absolutely nothing about, just like these drug dealers are doing right now when they’re mixing every drug on the market with fentanyl. And they’re killing the people we love.”
Sen. Brown cited data showing 110,000 Americans died due to unintentional drug overdoses in 2022.
Read the full article and watch the video on the CBS News website.
Do youth anti-drug campaigns actually work?
Programs at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and in Charlotte use modern slang to communicate a timeless message: Drugs can kill.
Students at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill now have access to free kits that revive someone suffering an opioid overdose and test strips to see what the drugs they are about to take contain.
These steps, which assume students are using drugs, are designed to save lives, but prompt the question: Will the tactics work for today’s students?
Riley Sullivan, the group’s cofounder and director, believes the kits will actually help reduce drug use on campus. He said the group has handed out about 900 naloxone kits and 500 fentanyl test strips this semester alone.
In Charlotte, a public awareness campaign called “Street Pills Kill” uses the slang of youth to convey the same message. The phrases are the new generation of “just say no” or “above the influence.”
“No cap, those pills are sus.”
Young people use the words “no cap” to say they are telling the truth or they aren’t lying. To use the word “cap” would mean someone is lying.
“Sus” is short for suspicious.
Another sign says: “you plus street pills equals … we don’t ship.”
“Ship” means you want two people to date or enter a romantic relationship.
The language is how kids speak nowadays, but will they listen to the kind of messaging?
Remember McGruff the Crime Dog or the “this is your brain on drugs” ad of a man cracking an egg on a skillet?
You might also remember other campaigns like “truth”and “DARE” to name a few.
Continue reading “Do youth anti-drug campaigns actually work?”