KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — Over the past few months, Knox County law enforcement and others have been targeting people from Detroit in an effort to cut off "prolific" amounts of drugs flowing into the area.
When they arrest someone, East Tennessee law enforcement agencies often make it a point now to tell people if the person they arrested had ties to Detroit. A group of East Tennessee District Attorney Generals said they want to keep it that way to warn would-be drug traffickers that Knoxville and its surrounding counties are a "hostile market" for them.
On Thursday, Knox County DA Charme Allen and four other DAs announced the "313 Initiative," which is a concerted effort from state and local law enforcement to share information to disrupt the flow of drugs and other crime that they said is originating from Detroit. The initiative gets its name from Detroit's 313 area code.
The DAs said law enforcement agencies are going to be utilizing "all resources and investigative tools" to identify people and groups from Detroit in an effort to cut off the pipeline.
"This 313 initiative will equip law enforcement and prosecutors with a centralized database where they can share information that will enable us to better identify and prosecute both our local dealers and the larger scale traffickers," 8th District Attorney General Jared Effler said.
Over the past decade, law enforcement in the Eastern U.S. said they have been battling against what they've dubbed the Interstate 75 "drug pipeline," which is a drug trafficking route that runs through Knoxville extending along I-75 from Michigan to Florida.
In 2015, Knoxville law enforcement said I-75 was a pipeline for heroin in the community. Now, they said they are trying to curb the flow the fentanyl and methamphetamine coming in from Detroit -- saying it's contributing to a large increase in violence and overdose deaths locally.
"It's just sort of a confluence of really bad things. There are countless numbers of Detroit cases within our criminal justice system," attorney Don Bosch said.
The 313 Initiative silently began in December 2022. Authorities said they have arrested 46 people connected to Detroit since then, seizing more than 40 pounds of meth, 8 pounds of fentanyl and heroin, multiple other drugs, and 29 guns.
The DAs said the initiative will work to share information and intelligence they get with other agencies through the database -- instead of keeping the information "locked away in a case file."
"This going to send a strong message to Detroit drug dealers that East Tennessee is not a place for them to set up shop," Effler said.
