Downtown Businesses Pleased With 'Operation Stink Bug'
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) -- Pittsburgh police and downtown business owners are declaring victory against street level drug dealers.
Police arrested more than 40 drug dealers since Tuesday in what is being called "Operation Stink Bug."
In Market Square, business owners aren't seeing drug dealers anymore and say it wasn't always this way.
"I could look out my window and I could see things going on that I wouldn't want to happen in front of my business," Mike Geiger, a Market Square restaurant owner, said.
Now Geiger says business is booming and the drug arrests and police patrols make a big difference.
Along Smithfield Street, people who take the bus are pleased with the police crackdown on drug dealers.
A woman who does not wish to be identified told the KDKA Investigators a drug dealer tried to sell to her a few days ago. Now she says that drug dealer is gone.
"I was standing there and there was a drug dealer and he said, 'Do you need anything?'"
Police tell the KDKA Investigators since they arrested more than 40 drug dealers downtown yesterday at least five are back out on the streets.
Police say they will stay on top of the problem.
"I'm looking to end the problem – not move it someplace else," Pittsburgh Police Chief Nate Harper said. "That's why there is an investigation that will continue to go on."
The police chief says his department will remain committed to the investigating drug cases downtown.
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