Saratoga County supervisors may back proposed heroin penalty

PHOTOGRAPHER: Stephen Williams

Saratoga County lawmakers are moving toward endorsing a proposed state law that would increase the penalty for heroin sales that lead to a death. Under the proposal, such sales could be treated like committing a murder.

The county Board of Supervisors’ Public Safety and Legislative and Research Committees on Tuesday each unanimously recommended the full board endorse “Laree’s Law,” named after a Colonie teenager whose mother was a police detective. Laree Farrell-Lincoln died of a heroin overdose in 2013.

County officials portrayed endorsement of the bill as a way of approaching the current heroin epidemic, which is being seen throughout the nation, in urban, suburban and rural areas. Officials in even the smallest Saratoga County communities say they’re aware of addiction cases or overdose deaths in their communities.

“To say there isn’t an epidemic is to put your head in the sand,” said Public Safety Committee Chairman Paul Lent, R-Galway.

“Laree’s Law” was approved by the state Senate in 2015, but did not pass the Assembly. Currently, someone who sells heroin or another opiate to someone who overdoses can only be charged with making a drug sale.

The proposed law would create a new crime called homicide by sale of an opiate controlled substance. It would apply to someone who sells an opiate drug that causes a death. The crime would be a Class I-A felony, with a potential penalty of 25 years to life in prison. Someone who buys heroin and shares it with someone else who dies could claim shared use as a possible defense, giving them an incentive to report the overdose.

The full Board of Supervisors could vote on a resolution endorsing the law and urging its legislative passage at its Feb. 23 meeting in Ballston Spa.

Reach Gazette reporter Stephen Williams at 395-3086, [email protected] or @gazettesteve on Twitter.