Morristown Police made three arrests last weekend on heroin-related charges after one woman overdosed and had to be revived and a hotel housekeeper pricked herself on a hypodermic needle.
In the first incident, police responded to the Price Chopper grocery store Friday, Sept. 2 at 7:40 p.m. to reports that a woman had collapsed inside the store. Jessica Cantwell, 20, of Morrisville, had reportedly overdosed on heroin and rescue squads revived her using naloxone, which counteracts the effects of opiates.
Police charged Cantwell with violating conditions of release, conditions that were set earlier this year after she allegedly slammed into another driver during a morning commute with drugs in her system.
Police say Ashley Miller, 22, of Morrisville, supplied the drugs that sent Cantwell into her overdose last Friday, alleging the two women were using heroin in a car prior to arriving at Price Chopper. Also in the car was a 4-year-old child.
Miller, the driver, was arrested with heroin distribution and cruelty toward a child.
Cantwell had been arrested earlier this year after slamming headfirst into a car during a mid-March morning commute. Police discovered traces of heroin and other narcotics in Cantwell’s system, and charged her with felony negligent driving.
This isn’t the first time Morristown Rescue personnel have had to use naloxone on a call, and department chief Nathan Pickard doesn’t believe it will be the last.
“I expect to see an increase in its use,” Pickard said.
Morristown Police have never had to deploy naloxone on a call; the officers only recently completed the required training. Deputies from the Lamoille County Sheriff’s department were first issued the medication earlier this summer and had to use it for a call in downtown Johnson in late June, less than two weeks after purchasing it.
Prick brings police
The next day, Sept. 3, police responded to a call from the Sunset Motor Inn that a housekeeper was stuck in the leg by an un-capped hypodermic needle poking through a trash bag she was taking out.
Searching the trash bag, police found eight hypodermic needles, six of which were uncapped. There was also a torn small wax paper envelope with the words “Donald Trump” printed in block letters. In July, Bennington County police seized a batch of heroin stamped with the presidential candidate, according to the affidavit.
Police charged Thomas Zapantis, 34, of Johnson, with misdemeanor heroin possession. He pleaded not guilty to the charge last week.
A hotel employee told police that a man suspected to be Zapantis — his name was on the registration card —arrived at the hotel by taxi on Aug. 31 along with a woman and young child, and paid cash for the room, reserving it until Sept. 4.
The employee told police that after the couple checked in, there was a “constant flow of vehicle and pedestrian traffic” coming and going daily from that room, with visitors typically staying for no more than 10 to 15 minutes.
Police arrested Zapantis as he was walking between the hotel and the Maplefields convenience store later that evening, after he tried to run away in flip-flops. While searching his hotel room, they found 20 new and used needles, a tourniquet, a spoon with burnt residue in it, and about 20 used wax-paper envelopes. The envelopes were stamped with the logos, “Donald Trump,” “Blackout” and “Merry X Mas.”
Zapantis made headlines two years ago when he was shot near Cumberland Farms in Morrisville. The alleged shooter’s case is still working its way through the court system.
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