After a double homicide in Springfield, Massachusetts on June 7th where investigators were met with gunfire, police launched a crackdown.
Over the course of eight days, officers from several law enforcement agencies conducted sweeps in the Union, High, and School streets area – a notorious place for drug-dealing and prostitution right in the Metro Center.
The police actions resulted in 44 arrests on guns and weapons charges, the confiscation of 14 illegal firearms, and the seizure of tens of thousands of pills that would have been sold on the streets as prescription medications but in reality contained fentanyl, announced Springfield Police Department Superintendent Cheryl Clapprood.
“After the officers came under the automatic gunfire, we said ‘enough is enough’ and we called in all the resources we could possibly get and really hit it,” Clapprood said.
Among the firearms seized were untraceable “ghost guns,” large magazines holding as many as 30 rounds, and handguns that had been illegally modified.
“The switches on some of these weapons make semi-automatic into automatic weapons,” Clapprood said. “The gunfire the officers took that night, it was unbelievable.”
Clapprood said information developed during the sweeps helped detectives identify a suspect in the double homicide. They arrested 19-year-old Adrian Perez of Springfield on murder charges. The circumstances of the double homicide remain under investigation.
The two men were found shot dead in a supposedly vacant apartment in the building in the 200 block of Union Street. The building owner, Springfield Gardens, supplied police with a tenant list and officers removed trespassers and squatters, said Clapprood.
“The tenant list provided by them was an asset,” she said.
Of the 44 people arrested, 30 were freed at their arraignments. Clapprood said it is “beyond frustrating.”
“From the court system and the judges a little bit of help would take care of this problem and we’re not seeing it,” Clapprood said.
Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno, who has repeatedly criticized judges for what he perceives to be leniency toward hardened criminals, said he’ll continue to lobby to give prosecutors more opportunities to challenge low bail amounts.
“I am going to continue to pound away on my bail reform legislation and would hope the legislature would do something about this,” Sarno said.
The seizure of the thousands of pills that contained a total of more than 2 pounds of fentanyl unquestionably saved lives said Captain Brian Keenan, the head of the Firearms Investigation Unit.
He said pills labeled as Xanax and Viagra contained fentanyl.
“Knock-off pills, you’d be dead if you took them,” Keenan said.
Clapprood underscored that the crackdown was completed without a single complaint of police misconduct – important because the department is functioning under a federal consent decree that required changes to its use-of-force policies and procedures.
“The Springfield Police Department has come a long way,” Clapprood said.
Last year, the city’s Department of Health and Human Services and the Hampden County Sheriff’s Department teamed up for an initiative in the Union, High, and School streets area to help people get treatment for addiction and obtain necessary social services.
“We have a compassionate side,” Sarno said.
Part of this year’s crackdown was an anti-prostitution sting that resulted in the arrests of 11 so-called “johns” and two women. The women were referred to social services provided by the sheriff’s department.
