Coatesville is the drug distribution center for Chester County.

At the present staff level of the Coatesville Pennsylvania Police Department there are three police officers on patrol at one time. At high crime times the Coatesville PD is augmented by surrounding police departments and PA State Troopers. High crime time in Coatesville is after dark.

Chester County Pennsylvania is among the ten wealthiest counties in the USA; a fox hunting playground for billionaires.

Coatesville is the drug distribution center for Chester County.

The drug business in Chester County is a multi-million dollar business. I believe that without Coatesville as the drug distribution hub in Chester County, the entire structure of drug distribution here could collapse.

Coatesville is a transportation hub in the center of Chester County. There is easy access to rail, air, and interstate roadways. A major drug dealer from New York City can deliver packages directly to dealers in Coatesville for distribution in Chester County via several routes. They are in and out in less than 20 minutes.

There is an entire sub-economy built on drug money here. Convicted crack dealer Edwin “Jack” Flamer was said to have done “charitable acts” with the money he made selling poison to our youth in Chester County. A combination of cash from drug dealers and death threats keeps people from talking to police. There is also a perception that you can’t trust all the police; that a policeman could “give you up” to the person threatening you. Some people say that Coatesville residents like the city the way it is. I don’t think so. It is a terrifying way to live.

Coatesville is a friendly community; a community rich in oral history, where families go back many generations. But, the money in drugs turns that very friendliness on its head. We live in a terrorized community, where not just an adult can be threatened; but that adult’s children, nephews, and grandchildren.

The threats are real. I believe that most of the recent shootings and murders involved people that were about to testify in trials.

I am still hearing calls for police to be recruited from Coatesville, that they be long time Coatesville residents. I believe that this call for Coatesville officers was initiated by drug dealers. If police officers and their families are required to not only live here but be long time Coatesville residents; that police officer’s extended family could also be threatened. I believe that this is part of an effort by the drug entrepreneurs in the city to gain a strong foothold in the Coatesville Police department.

Coatesville is a small city of 11,000 with the infrastructure for 20,000 residents.

There are many Coatesville residents and former residents who live nearby that have spent years of their lives working with youth, civic groups and politicians; trying to bring the city around. There was an attempt to revitalize Coatesville and move away from a drug economy to a normal thriving city. Then County Commissioner Andy Dinniman worked with dedicated community members, PA Career Link and the Laborers District Council Training facility in Exton, PA to develop skilled, trained Coatesville residents to help build the city’s redevelopment that was then in the works. By 2005 drug dealers could not live in the city, a plan for redevelopment was in place and the developers were lined up. After 8 years of very hard work Coatesville was about to “flip over”. Then a new city council moved in and in my opinion trashed the redevelopment. And at the same time I believe that the new administration trashed the Coatesville Police Department.

When the Coatesville Police Force collapsed and “the money was good again in Coatesville”, the drug dealers came back. And they came back in a terrifying way.

We are really hurting here in Coatesville; and we have gotten fleeting aid from County Commissioner Andy Dinniman and Governor Rendell. But, so far the only elected public official from the County, State or Federal Government to put himself on the line and really come to our aid is Chester County District Attorney Joe Carroll.

The USDoJ, ATF, FBI and DEA are awakening from a long Bush Administration imposed sleep. Hopefully some of that awakening can come here to Coatesville, PA.

I believe the scale of the drug business in Chester County cannot exist without the cooperation of corrupt public officials.

I think every politician and law enforcement officer in Pennsylvania should read:
“POLICE, POLITICS. CORRUPTION ‘The mixture dangerous to freedom and justice” By Colonel Frank McKetta, Retired Pennsylvania State Police Commissioner