Saddle Brook Police Chief Goes To White House: Heroin, Cocaine, Fentanyl Dominate L.E.A.D. Talk

Heroin and cocaine laced with fentanyl are killing drug users nationwide in staggering numbers, Saddle Brook Police Chief Robert Kugler said after joining Vice President Mike Pence at the White House to boost the L.E.A.D. (Law Enforcement Against Drugs) program.

“Our uniformed law enforcement presence was intended to sound our alarm that this drug epidemic needs to be fought on all grounds and levels,” said Kugler, who is L.E.A.D.’s national chairman.

Pence and Jim Carroll, the White House National Drug Control Policy director, “both expressed support of our community prevention efforts and to law enforcement as a whole,” the chief told Daily Voice.

“The traditional war on drugs of strict enforcement and prosecution needs to be combined with early community and school-based education and prevention efforts – such as our L.E.A.D. program — as well as rehabilitation services easily available and reachable by those in need,” Kugler said.

Thursday’s gathering in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building on the grounds of the White House included remarks from Kugler, Pence, Carroll and Special White House Advisor Kellyanne Conway.

Kugler and L.E.A.D. Executive Director Nicholas Demauro led an 18-member contingent of board members, administrators and L.E.A.D. representatives from Florida, New Hampshire, Tennessee and New Jersey (

see photo below

).

Their primary concern was the rise in drug overdose deaths across the country.

National Drug Control Policy Office representatives pointed to the dangerous rise in both heroin and cocaine that is laced with fentanyl, which often produces fatal overdoses.

ABOVE: Vice President Mike Pence (COURTESY: Saddle Brook Police Chief Robert Kugler).

L.E.A.D. is the most rapidly-growing drug prevention organization in the U.S., De Mauro noted.

MORE:

www.leadrugs.org

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