YOUNGSTOWN — Sgt. Larry McLaughlin Jr. of the Mahoning County Sheriff’s Office knows that the work of the organization he leads — the Mahoning Valley Law Enforcement Task Force — is extremely important to the lives and safety of everyday people.

He also knows that few people know much about the organization, known during the 2000s as the Mahoning County Drug Task Force, but was changed when Liberty and Vienna were added.

It’s good that not a lot of people know the inner workings of the task force because its primary goal is to arrest and convict mid to upper-level drug dealers, which involves covert work.

However, it would be good for the public to know that in 2023, the task force initiated investigations that involved 196 individuals and 36 people were sentenced to a combined 63 years in prison and 45 years of probation, McLaughlin says.

It also would be helpful for the public to know that the task force seized 34 pounds of methamphetamine last year and has seized more than three times that much already in 2024 because of the increased use of the drug.

In fact, methamphetamine was such a focus of the task force’s work last year that 92% of its undercover drug buys were for “meth,” McLaughlin said.

By comparison, only 2% was for fentanyl, 4% for cocaine, and the other 2% for crack cocaine.

A drug task force like this focuses on investigations of the drugs that need the most attention, so the fact that 92% of the task force’s investigations were focused on methamphetamine shows what a serious threat the drug has become, McLaughlin said during a recent interview.

The reason for meth overtaking many other drugs is the low cost, which is “creating a demand,” McLaughlin said. It means that “a lot of people that wouldn’t have used methamphetamine years ago would now look to use meth. A lot of people who trafficked other alleged drugs are now starting to traffic methamphetamine,” he said.

It is coming across the southern border of the United States, he said.

There was a time not long ago when people would cook meth in their own home or garage, including in the Mahoning Valley. But that is nearly gone. The more significant issue now is what are called “conversion labs” which convert the drug from a liquid to a crystalline form. That is taking place mostly closer to the border, McLaughlin said.

“It’s not cost effective to make your own,” he said.

That emphasis on stopping the meth trade does not mean that is the only drug being abused in the Mahoning Valley, he said. He estimated that the most commonly abused drugs are meth, fentanyl and cocaine. “We’re going off of what the streets are telling us,” he said.

“There is almost no heroin anymore. Anything that is sold as heroin comes back as fentanyl,” he said. “Cocaine is still high. You still have a decent amount of cocaine users and crack, but meth has jumped into this equation now to where it is a problem.”

McLaughlin said meth abuse does not show the overdose death rates in the way fentanyl and heroin do, but it is still destructive, especially in the way it can destroy a person’s appearance, he said.

One problem with meth is that some people use it to improve their performance on certain tasks, such as studying, McLaughlin said. It’s one reason attention-deficit drugs such as Adderall are abused — they contain amphetamine salts, according to the drugs.com website.

McLaughlin said when college students use meth to study, “You just went down that rabbit hole, where five years from now — have you seen those photos that show the faces of meth? It might be good in the beginning … but slowly, eventually, it’s going to take your life,” he said.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration website says “Amphetamines are stimulants that speed up the body’s system. Some are legally prescribed and used to treat attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder.”

EDUCATION

While most of their work is covert and behind the scenes, McLaughlin said it’s good to let the public know about the task force’s work as much as possible. However, they still have to be careful because of the nature of their work.

The task force operates on grant funds, though the people who work for the task force are paid by their “home agencies.” In addition to grants, they receive money through forfeiture of drug money as a result of prosecutions.

Many times in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court, a person’s indictment will say that the person was indicted on a specification of forfeiture of money in a drug case. That means money was seized during an investigation. At the end of the investigation, such funds can be forfeited to the task force to fund its work.

There is a way to file a civil action to transfer such funds to the task force also, he said.

He said there can be situations where cash is seized during a traffic stop, for instance, and the person in the car with drugs says the money does not belong to him or her.

“We know it’s drug money. Who is going to abandon $50,000?” McLaughlin said.

Last year, task force investigations resulted in 21 charges being filed in federal court and 62 being filed in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.

There were 36 people sentenced on 83 charges for drug crimes investigated by the task force in 2023 — six in federal court and 30 in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.

Of the 63 prison years handed down by judges in those cases, 23 were in federal cases and the other 40 were in cases in common pleas court. Defendants also received 22 years of probation in federal court and 23 years of probation in common pleas court.

McLaughlin said each case is evaluated individually to determine whether a federal prosecution is the best route or a prosecution in common pleas court.

“We’re looking to do whatever is going to serve the community best — what is going to have the biggest impact on the drug trade and the community,” he said.

He said unfortunately when individuals are sent to state or federal prison it is “almost criminal college” because inmates learn trafficking tips from other inmates while they’re locked up.

Drug traffickers make connections with others that they might later make drug deals with, McLaughlin said.

WARRANTS

In 2023, the task force executed 60 search warrants in the Mahoning Valley with 40 of them taking place in Youngstown. It also executed four search warrants in Liberty Township, two in Austintown, two in Boardman, two in Columbiana County, and one in Warren. It executed another nine warrants for cell phones, computers and a vehicle, according to the task force’s annual report.

GANGS

The public may not understand the changes in terminology associated with drug dealing, McLaughlin said. At one time, people talked about drug gangs, including in Youngstown.

For instance, in 2015, the last of 12 members of a West Side street gang known as the E Block entered a guilty plea in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court to various charges, including aggravated robbery.

Gang members were “rounded up in May 2014 as prosecutors and police said they were members of the E Block, which operated around Evanston, Lakeview and Portland avenues on lower Mahoning Avenue on the West Side,” the Vindicator reported.

McLaughlin said such “gangs” still exist today, but they do not use geographical names the way they once did.

“Now it is as simple as we come from the same general neighborhood or we just happened to be buddies who operate together. There’s a hierarchy and somebody’s always trying to move up in that hierarchy or do more. So, the ‘gang,’ such as Bloods or Crips and other names, we don’t see that as often,” McLaughlin said.

“They are operating as a gang or a criminal enterprise, but they are not necessarily going by a gang name. It’s a gang without a name.”

It’s not uncommon for federal indictments to list lots of people in a criminal enterprise involving drug dealing. The Mahoning Valley Law Enforcement Task Force is involved in those types of investigations, but they are working hand-in-hand with the FBI on them, McLaughlin said. There is an FBI agent assigned to the task force.

Federal prosecutions frequently involve longer prison sentences than convictions in common pleas court.

However, the prosecution of Jerome T. Miller, 38, by the Mahoning County Prosecutor’s Office resulted in a trial in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court. Miller was sentenced to 20 to 25.5 years in prison last October.

“That worked out — to the credit of the investigator and the prosecution team,” McLaughlin said. That was a great result.” McLaughlin was at the prosecution table throughout the trial.

McLaughlin said Miller was convicted of possessing about three pounds of cocaine and other offenses.

The task force made covert drug purchases of crack cocaine, heroin and marijuana from him. The investigation was about 18 months long, ending in 2022. A search warrant was executed at a home on Franklin and Cameron avenues in Youngstown in the investigation, McLaughlin said.

“We need to hold those accountable who are putting this stuff out on the street,” he said of illegal drugs.

DRUGS AND CRIME

When asked about the connection between drug dealing and violent crime, McLaughlin said the two “go hand in hand, along with thefts, robberies, burglaries. Almost 99% trace back to drug use or distribution,” he said.

McLaughlin doesn’t think the public readily considers how much the price of goods everyone uses have risen because of the thefts by addicts.

“I think people don’t realize unless it’s at my front door, it doesn’t matter. But it’s up and down your sidewalk. It’s ringing your doorbell. You’re just not answering.

“I know what it’s done to the community. I know what it’s done to good people who have made some bad choices. I’ve never met a kid who said when I grow up I’m going to be a drug abuser and steal mom’s ring or rob Grandma,” he said. “They would have never made those choices had they not gone down that road. And the people who are putting that stuff in those people’s hands, that’s my mission — to rid the community of them. And that’s what I think the people who are assigned here care about.”

Got an interesting story? Email Ed Runyan at erunyan@vindy.com