Thursday, October 1, 2026
By Rob Morris on October 2, 2013
Alarmed by disturbing evidence of rising drug use and street sales, Wanchese residents are moving to set up a community watch while the Dare County Sheriff’s Office plans to assign a special unit to sweep neighborhoods and act on complaints.
Several arrests on heroin charges have put Wanchese in the spotlight this year, but residents say they have seen signs of trouble for some time: discarded hypodermic needles on roadsides, drug transactions in cars and boats and groups of people roaming the streets late at night.
About 100 people turned out Tuesday for a meeting at the Wanchese Community Building, where substance abuse experts outlined drug problems in Dare County and praised residents for taking a positive step to combat them.
They provided statistics and information on drug treatment and urged families and friends to get help for those struggling with addiction.
Sheriff Doug Doughtie promised to assign an extra three-deputy unit to establish a police presence that would more than double the number of officers to as many as eight on any given night.
“You’re really going to like me a lot after tonight, or you’re really going to hate me,” Doughtie said. “because we’re getting ready to do something that we’ve been talking about for a while.”
The three-man unit includes a deputy with 10 years of experience that includes drug enforcement work in Kill Devil Hills and an evidence expert.
“I’m going to push the law to the limit,” Doughtie said. To loud applause, he said his deputies will not cross ethical or legal lines, but “we’re going to test that line and see how far we can go. We’re going to aggravate the dog turd out of a whole lot of folks.”
Doughtie acknowledged the presence of houses reputed for drug use and transactions and said current investigations could eventually shut them down.
But he asked citizens for help.
“Right now, you know, down here it’s heroin and it’s everywhere,” he said. “I’m sure you see it on an everyday basis. I hear that there’s six or seven houses that a lot of you people know about that we probably have heard about, but we don’t know all of them and we don’t know particulars.”
Later, Lt. Tony Duvall outlined how to form a community watch. He said the effort would require giving police specific details of suspicious activities and people as well as perseverance.
A community watch in Wanchese could eventually include an organizing committee and designated neighborhoods with captains.
The drive for a community watch is being led by Kamala Warren, a mother of four and lifelong Wanchese resident who organized the meeting, and Missie Daniels.
Warren said she became aware of the drug problem after seeing a Facebook post about a Wanchese man who was arrested after the theft of deck reels. An investigation indicated that he had later used the fishing reels to obtain drugs.
Residents told her that they had seen hypodermic needles on the roadside while horseback riding, she said.
“I had no idea the scope we’re dealing with,” she said.
