Seniors Charged With Selling Prescriptions
PRESTONSBURG, Ky. - Dottie Neeley, 87, was fingerprinted, photographed and thrown in jail, imprisoned as much by the tubing from her oxygen tank as by the concrete and steel around her.
The woman — who spent two days in jail after her arrest last December — is among a growing number of Kentucky senior citizens charged in a crackdown on a crime authorities say is rampant in Appalachia: Elderly people are reselling their painkillers and other medications to addicts.
"When a person is on Social Security, drawing $500 a month, and they can sell their pain pills for $10 apiece, they'll take half of them for themselves and sell the other half to pay their electric bills or buy groceries," Floyd County jailer Roger Webb said.
...
The Rev. Doug Abner, pastor of Community Church in Manchester and an anti-drug activist, said senior citizens may not understand the seriousness of selling prescription drugs.
"They justify it because they're having a hard time financially," he said. "Left to ourselves, we can justify anything, but they're really part of the problem."
More:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051212/ap_on_he_me/elderly_drug_dealers;_ylt=ApQ0V.zWDfqNudHfqoujpz6s0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3ODdxdHBhBHNlYwM5NjQ-Is it a crime to be poor in America now?
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