When Officials Get Caught Using Drugs

Posted by azdrugrehabctr on January 22, 2015 under Opiate Abuse | Comments are off for this article

In this day and age it has become quite clear that no one is immune to the pulls of a drug addiction. One FBI agent proved this when he admitted to being addicted to heroin and stealing evidence from cases to fund his habit. In the wake of this confession, the agency is taking a hard look at their offices and the protocol for securing evidence, all in an effort to avoid future breaches in security, like the one agent Matthew Lowry managed for fourteen months while on the job.

When heroin is seized by the FBI it is immediately weighed, documented, sealed and delivered to an evidence room where the drugs sit until trial. Lowry was able to siphon heroin from these evidence bags because he was on the heroin task force. This means that he was given access to heroin on an almost daily basis.

Lowry’s scheme was allegedly rather intricate and involved much deception. It was reported that oftentimes Lowry would go into the evidence room and take heroin that was part of cases that were already closed. This ensured that the agents working on that case would not need to access the drugs for court purposes. When Lowry was unable to take heroin from closed cases he would take heroin from open cases under the guise that he was taking it to the lab to be tested. Lowry would take the drugs home and consume much of it, replacing what he consumed with laxatives or creatine. In order to keep his habit, Lowry had to forge other agent’s names and signatures so that the drugs would not be traced back to him.

Lowry has since admitted to his crime and has spurned an internal investigation into how the FBI deals with evidence and who has access to guns and drugs. Since the investigation has started the FBI revealed that they have “found that every one of the nation’s field offices had problems tracking gun and drug evidence and that in some cases, drugs disappeared for months without notice”.

Because of Lowry’s transgressions, 150 defendants in drug cases throughout the country may potentially go free, lawyers finding it difficult to prosecute without the evidence.