New Castle County and state officials on Friday unveiled “Hero Help,” a new program that will provide assessment and treatment instead of arrest to eligible drug users who voluntarily seek help.
County Executive Thomas P. Gordon and New Castle County Police Chief E.M. Setting detailed the program in a news conference late last week with State Prosecutor Kathleen M. Jennings, Department of Health and Social Services Secretary Rita Landgraf and Michael Barbieri, director of the Division of Substance Abuse and Mental Health.
Hero Help is not open to violent criminals, gang members, drug dealers, weapon offenders or anyone with a long criminal record, current or pending domestic violence charges or violence against law enforcement officers, Gordon said.
Participants must agree to intake with a substance abuse counselor, review of past and present criminal charges and admission to a rehabilitation facility.
Noting there were 228 overdose deaths in Delaware last year alone, Jennings praised all involved in developing Hero Help. “This is a brave program and an expansion of the role of policing as well as prosecution,” she said. “We have great hopes for this program.”
Landgraf praised the program’s premise of recognizing addiction as a disease, noting that while there is much talk about the diseases of Zika and Ebola, addiction represents “the greatest epidemic that we have ever seen.
Hero Help broadens how county police approach that epidemic, Setting said. He noted that county police were the first major agency to carry the lifesaving drug that reverses opioid overdoses – with 25 saves in just over a year – and continues its ‘Heroin Alert Program” taking the message of prevention and treatment into the community.
He said Hero Help represents “a very different approach to how we deal with people suffering from addiction,” adding appreciation for the inter-agency cooperation and support it has received. “In any other setting, this would have taken years to get this program going,” he said.
Attorney General Matt Denn said state justice officials “are encouraged to see this new program from the New Castle County Police and we look forward to helping make the program a success.”
