BERWICK — The Maine Drug Enforcement Agency announced Friday that agents last Saturday arrested a Berwick man they say was “a significant distributor” of oxycodone in southern Maine and New Hampshire.
Donald Packer, 38, was charged with aggravated trafficking in scheduled drugs after Berwick police allegedly stopped him as he returned from Connecticut and seized 1,100 30-milligram oxycodone pills that Packer allegedly planned to sell in Maine and New Hampshire, MDEA Cmdr. Scott Pelletier said Friday.
Packer’s brother, Timothy Packer, 36, was also arrested and charged with possession of of scheduled drugs, namely heroin.
Donald Packer was released from York County Jail on Thursday after posting $5,000 cash bail, according to a jail official.
His arrest comes as the result of a months-long investigation by MDEA agents from the York District Task Force, the New Hampshire attorney general’s office and police departments from Berwick, Maine, and Somersworth and Rochester, N.H.
According to Pelletier, the investigation began after oxycodone became increasingly available in York County and Somersworth and Rochester, N.H.
“We’re talking about thousands and thousands of pills being brought into New Hampshire and Maine for distribution,” Pelletier said. “All of our efforts are [focused on] finding out who is the major distributor and where are they getting the actual pills. Does somebody have a pill mill? Are they from overseas? Are they legitimately from a pharmaceutical company?”
In a related case, the New Hampshire Attorney General’s Drug Task Force executed a search warrant at a Rochester, N.H., home and seized approximately 365 Percocet, clonazepam, and oxycodone pills, as well as $15,000 that officials suspect represents drug proceeds, according to the release.
Pelletier said the multi-state investigation continues and additional arrests are likely.
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