Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
A Utah dad is getting national attention: again. This time in People Magazine for a Web site he helped create that allows anyone to get involved in the fight against drugs.
There's a new confidential drug tip form on the Department of Public Safety's Web site. And it's because of a Utah dad who is fighting hard against drug dealers.
Lance Merrill spends his days laying concrete. But, when he's not on the job, he works even harder at getting drug dealers off the streets. He started a Web site to collect tips two years ago after his daughter overdosed on heroin and died. "It's helping. We're doing really good thing," Merrill says.
But he says his Web site www.dadsagainstdrugdealers.com had some problems.
He says, "The problem we had is that if you give a tip from a public citizen to police department, most of the time the city police departments don't do felony drug arrests."
To address the problem, Merrill went to Rep. Chris Herrod for help. And after months of hard, the Department of Public Safety's Web site is finally up and running. It allows anyone to report drug activity or a drug dealer, and stay completely anonymous.
Herrod says, "There's hasn't been a centrally located place before where people can go, not knowing, call Provo City or Orem. You just go to the Web site. We'll assign it and make sure it gets to the right person."
The follow through is what Merrill is most concerned about. He says, "A lot of people see drug activity that they'd like to get to police. They call a janitor at the police department, and it never gets to the right person."
Merrill wants to get the word out so the tips will start pouring in. And he's hoping an article in this week's People Magazine that tells his story helps. "We've got the help people," he says. "That's my message, my passion. I am passionate about it."
We're told the tips are coming in and many of them are being investigated.
E-mail: corton@ksl.com
