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Attempts to identify and shut down a local heroin distribution network believed responsible for overdose deaths continued this week, law enforcement officials said.
At least three deaths in Terrebonne Parish over the past two months have been linked to heroin, Sheriff Jerry Larpenter has said.
A woman sought in connection with one of those deaths, 27-year old Shantelle White, was taken into custody Saturday night. Her arrest, which occurred without incident, was the result of a widespread hunt that led detectives to a home on Henderson Street.
She is accused of supplying heroin to a Houma woman who was found dead early this month in a room at the Economy Inn. White eluded officers who actively sought her, abandoning locations they had pinpointed in some cases less than an hour before they moved in.
White remains at the Terrebonne Parish jail, where she was booked on a charge of second-degree murder and a parole violation in connection with the death of Christy Hurst. Her bond was set at $700,000.
Sheriff Jerry Larpenter said he was pleased his detectives were able to close the case.
“They love their job, they try to do what they can with getting bad people off the streets,” Larpenter said, reiterating his assessment of the heroin problem in Terrebonne
and adjoining parishes as being part of a national flood.
The purity of the product, he said, is what’s killing people. “That heroin is coming in from every different direction, though it is brought here primarily by the Mexicans. This isn’t drugs, it’s poison.”
Larpenter said the heroin that has sent people to hospitals – while a serious problem – is one facet of a broader issue of drug use in the community, that includes continued abuse of prescription medicines, as well as methamphetamine and other substances.
How helpful the arrest of White will be in terms of the hunt for the heroin connection remains to be seen; she was said to have been generally uncooperative after her arrest, authorities said.
But other cases – including investigations resulting from non-fatal overdoses showing up at area hospitals – are still a strong focus of investigators, a Sheriff ’s Office spokeswoman said.
