batavia

A tractor-trailer's brakes are reportedly on fire on Route 5, in front of Kiwanis Park. It is hauling another trailer. Smoke is coming from the tractor, according to a responder at the scene. Town of Batavia Fire Department is en route.

UPDATE 4:36 p.m.: The fire is out. Town of Batavia is back in service.

Jonathan Martinez is a happy, energetic young man who has come across a tough break.

Known by the nickname "Tan-Tan" to his co-workers at Rancho Viejo Mexican Restaurant (and formerly to his co-workers at Margarita's), Martinez is well liked by everyone.

"He's always smiling," said his sister, Elena Vega. "He's a really humble, amazing person."

Martinez, 24, was diagnosed with germ cell cancer in December. The cancer was successfully removed, and he enjoyed a period of remarkable recovery until he returned to the doctor for a follow-up in March. It was then that he was diagnosed with spindle cell cancer, which was found around his liver.

He is now in hospice at Batavia's Crossroads House. Things are tough, but he has a positive attitude and is confident that he can beat the cancer.

There is a benefit fundraiser for Martinez today at Austin Park, at the corner of Washington and Jefferson Avenues in Batavia. It started at 1 p.m. and will last until dusk. There is no admission fee, but donations will be collected.

Live music will be featured, including performances by Soulcraft and Amos Williams. Jerry Smith, known in local circles as "Honeybun," will be the master of ceremonies.

Donations will be used to help with the medical expenses of Martinez' treatment, which are quite daunting.

"It's really expensive," Vega said. "We haven't paid for anything yet."

Services from the past seven months for which Martinez' family must still pay include chemotherapy, surgery, X-rays, CAT scans, biopsies and blood transfusions (Vega said her brother's cell count is still very low).

Throughout all the challenges he has come to face, Martinez has been sustained by the love he has for his family -- especially his 3-year-old daughter, Jonelis (pictured).

"He keeps saying he's going to 'come out standing like a rock for his baby girl,' " Vega said. "She is his life."

Martinez' faith has also been key to his positive outlook.

"He has tremendous faith in God," Vega said. "We know there's a purpose in this. We're just waiting for a miracle."

Photo taken by Nelle Williams

A large dog is locked in an older green car in front of Michael's craft store in the Target shopping center. It is barking furiously. A deputy is on scene and reports "I'll be attempting to locate (the owner). The dog is very aggressive. You can't get near it." The car is registered to a man in the City of Batavia.

UPDATE 3:02 p.m.: When the deputy first arrived, he noted the windows are down. An animal control officer is responding.

A dog is sweltering inside a silver-grayish Chevy TrailBlazer in the parking lot of Walmart in Batavia. The SUV has Florida plates. A Sheriff's deputy is responding.

The sister of Jason Lang, as promised, has announced a date for a protest against bath salts. It will take place in front of 420 Emporium, 400 Ellicott St., Batavia.

The protest, Brandi Smith said, is set for 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m., Wednesday, July 18.

"We're asking anyone who would like to join us to please meet at the location," Smith said. "This protest is against the sale and use of bath salts. I have seen bath salts ruin lives, families, people have died, and the bizarre actions of people using bath salts puts everyone in the community in danger."

On Tuesday, Smith's mother Nicole Lang confronted store employees because she believes 420 Emporium has been selling bath salts to her son, Jason Lang.

A store employee told police that Lang entered the store that night "and began yelling and screaming ‘You’re selling bath salts and killing my son.' "

At the scene -- Nicole Lang was cited for alleged trespass -- Lang and Smith vowed to mount a protest against the store.

"I'm sending out a plea to the whole community to please give a little of your time to participate in the protest," Smith said last night. "I feel this is an emergency situation that needs immediate attention. My hope is people will become more aware to this nightmarish situation."

Jason Lang is the former owner of The Laughing Buddha, a tattoo parlor and head shop on Ellicott Avenue. Smith worked for a time as manager of the shop.

While Lang has admitted to selling synthetic marijuana in the past, he's always denied selling bath salts.

The bath salt issue, however, has recently hit the Lang family hard. Jason Lang has been arrested for allegedly calling the landlord of 420 Emporium and impersonating law enforcement, trying to convince the landlord not to rent to the Brockport-based business, allegedly warning the property owner that the retail chain sells bath salts.

In recent weeks, Lang has reportedly made several 9-1-1 calls and was arrested July 1 for allegedly falsely reporting hearing gunshots at a local hotel.

The mother of Lang's child, Ashley Keene, is accused of giving bath salts to a 14-year-old girl. According to the girl's statement to police, Lang and Keene drove to the 420 Emporium location in Warsaw to buy two packages of "Amped," a brand of bath salt, on Memorial Day.

City Manager Jason Molino said the planned protest might be an appropriate neighborhood response.

"If that's what's going on inside that establishment, and if the neighborhood is fed up, it's certainly within their right to do that," Molino said.

The Batavian called the 420 Emporium in Batavia today to get reaction from the store manager to the planned protest, but he wasn't available for comment.

Besides Brockport, Batavia and Warsaw, 420 Emporium operates stores in Rochester, Syracuse and Fulton.

The photo above was taken Thursday morning. Up until at least Wednesday afternoon, the store had its business name painted in the windows of the shop.  Employees have apparently removed the name of the business from the window.

Even if people can't come out on Wednesday, Smith asked people to pray about the bath salt issue.

"As a Christian and a member of the Batavia Assembly of God, I urge people to pray for any and all who have been affected by bath salts," Smith said. "Jesus is love. Bath salts are evil."

For more information on Smith's plans or to help in organizing the protest, contact her at 585-300-7790.

Eric Betz says he and a lot of his friends are pretty unhappy with what they're seeing in Batavia right now.

Betz wants to do something about it: raise awareness of the dangers of bath salts and send a message that not everybody who enjoys an alternative lifestyle approves of this behavior.

"We don't want people who enjoy their freedom of expression to be equated to these scumbags," Betz said.

He's working on organizing a community event sometime soon that he hopes will bring the community together to rally against bath salts.

He said a few local businesses, such as Bourbon & Burger, Foxprowl Collectables and CPR Computer, have signed on to support the event. Next he wants to talk to the City of Batavia to get permission to hold the event in Austin Park. 

He's also looking for a donation of a car that people can take a whack at with a sledge hammer as a "your brain on bath salts" message.

At $5 a hammer swing, Betz is hoping to raise money for GCASA or another substance abuse program.

Betz, manager and a tattoo artist for Affliction Ink, 440 Ellicott St., Batavia, said "almost every one of my clients is against this crap."

Affliction Ink is owned by Eric Weiss. Both Weiss and Betz are former employees of The Laughing Buddha (440 Ellicott is the Buddha's original location) who left their jobs there, Betz said, because they were concerned about Jason Lang allegedly selling synthetic marijuana. 

Now they're just down the street from 420 Emporium (located at 400 Ellicott St.), which Betz believes has sold bath salts, and he said if they were or are, it's bad for the neighborhood.

People sometimes confuse the two businesses, he said, and he wants to make the distinction clear. Affliction Ink has nothing to do with bath salts, he said, though some people still come into the store looking to buy packages of the narcotic.

"It's getting out of hand," Betz said. "We see people walk by every day high on this stuff. It's disgusting."

One of the big dangers of bath salts, Betz said, is that it makes people paranoid and they might act irrationally, making them a danger not just to themselves but anybody in the community.

"We want to raise awareness about it," Betz said. "I'm tired of hearing people saying they want to leave Batavia because of it. This is my home. I love it here."

Rich Clark of CPR Computers has set up a Facebook page for the planned event, "Let's Beat Bath Salts."

UPDATE: The event is scheduled for 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., July 28, at L&L Transmission, 8781 Alexander Road, Batavia.  Additional businesses supporting the event: Neptunes Gardens Pet Shop, Rochester Metal Booking, B-Town Yellow Taxi, My T-Shirts Etc.  Also, I'm told I got Eric's profession wrong. He does piercings for Affliction Ink.

This morning city employee Colton Cole was watering the city's hosta garden outside of City Centre.

Andrew J. Ashley, 25, of 91 W. Main St., Le Roy, is charged with DWI, driving with a BAC of .08 or greater and using a mobile phone while driving. According to Le Roy PD, Ashley was driving on Route 19 and allegedly texting while driving when he failed to negotiate a curve at Route 19 and Wolcott Street. Ashley's vehicle struck a curb and the vehicle's axle broke.

Danielle Marie Stevens, 35, of Ford Road, Elba, is charged with criminal trespass, 2nd. Stevens was arrested on a warrant by State Police following a traffic stop. Stevens was turned over to the Sheriff's Office, arraigned and jailed on $1,250 bail.

Rebecca Louise Batt, 31, of East Bethany Le Roy Road, Bethany, is charged with DWI and driving with a BAC of .18 or greater. Batt was arrested following a trespassing complaint at 1:48 a.m., Thursday, when Batt allegedly drove her vehicle into the back yard of a residence on East Bethany Le Roy Road and parked without permission of the homeowner.

Wendy L. Mucher, 42, of Lewiston Road, Batavia, is charged with petit larceny and criminal mischief. Mucher is accused of stealing $29.34 worth of merchandise that she removed from its packaging from a business on Veterans Memorial Drive.

Joseph Daniel Barone, 30, of Woodbriar Drive, Rochester, is charged with criminal possession of a controlled substance, 7th, and unlawful possession of marijuana. Barone was stopped at 8:38 p.m. Thursday on Route 77 in Pembroke by Deputy Patrick Reeves. A search of the vehicle allegedly found alcohol, crack cocaine and marijuana.

Melissa Ann Neely, 42, of Lincoln Mills Road, East Rochester, is charged with controlled substance not its original container. Neely was charged following a traffic stop at 9:09 p.m. Thursday on Route 77, Pembroke, by Deputy Patrick Reeves.

Jacob D. Waite, 20, of 3661 Pike Road, Batavia, is charged with DWI, driving with a BAC of .08 or greater and driving left of pavement markings. Waite was arrested by Attica PD following a traffic stop at 11:45 p.m. Wednesday on Market Street, Attica.

The new LCD-based sign, replacing the old neon sign, atop Batavia Downs was illuminated for the first time Thursday evening.

A dog is reportedly locked in a black four-door sedan -- "with minimal air" -- in the parking lot of Walmart, near the food entrance. At 6 p.m., the temperature was 88, according to dispatch. Law enforcement is responding.

City police are responding to an address on Burke Drive after it was reported that a young female, approximately 20 years old, was in the area soliciting free vacuuming service. A white vehicle, unfamiliar to the caller, was reported to be parked on the street, however it is now gone.

A field fire is reported at 4271 Drake St. Road in Elba. Elba Fire Department is responding. The location is between South Main Street and Weatherwax Road. Fire equipment from the towns of Oakfield, Batavia and Byron are also requested.

UPDATE 4:11 p.m.: Drake Street Road and Weatherwax are being shut down.

UPDATE 4:16 p.m.: Fire police are stationed at routes 262 and 98. A Bergen tanker is requested to fill in at Byron's hall. The wind is 10 mph out of the east.

UPDATE 5:01 p.m.: Batavia and Oakfield are back in service.

UPDATE 5:06 p.m.: The fire is out. Elba, Byron and Bergen are back in service. The roadway is reopened.

Press release:

On Saturday, July 28, the Town of Batavia Fire Department will hold its 13th Annual Harley-Davidson Fat Boy Raffle. (The model is a 2012 FLSTFB.)

The event runs from 8 p.m. until midnight -- rain or shine. It will feature a beer tent and live entertainment by the band 7th Heaven. Food and refreshments will be available for purchase from Alex’s Place.

The event is free admission and open to the public, a ticket purchase is not necessary to attend. Tickets are limited to 2,500 and the money raised benefits the town fire department. Each ticket costs $20 and they are still available, sold on a first-come-first-serve basis. 

This year we are offering a $10,000 cash prize in lieu of the motorcycle to the Grand Prize winner. They will have the option of the bike or the cash prize.

To buy a ticket, checks and money orders can be made out to the “Town of Batavia Fire Dept. Raffle” and mailed to:

C/O Raffle Chairman
Town of Batavia Fire Dept.
P.O. Box 417
Batavia, NY 14021-0417

For further information please visit: <http://townofbataviafire.com>, call 344-3284, ext. 12, or email tbfdraffle@townofbataviafire.com

A dog has been locked inside a white Ford Chevy Equinox for at least 10 minutes in the parking lot of Target in Batavia. A Sheriff's deputy is responding.

The vehicle is registered to a person in Darien.

In California, I didn't see many asphalt driveways. For whatever reason, most homeowners there prefer concrete (weather, I imagine, is a factor).

It didn't take long after moving to Western New York to figure out that here asphalt is the preferred surface for driveways, and if you're a homeowner who takes routine maintenance seriously, you periodically get your driveway sealed.

A couple of years ago I suggested to Scott Kopper, owner of WNY Blacktop Sealers, that I come out to one of his jobs some time and take a few pictures and learn a little bit about why sealing an asphalt driveway is important. This morning, we actually finally got together for one of his jobs.

Here's what he told me: "A blacktop drive way is a big investment and you want to protect that investment. What blacktop sealing does, not only does it look good, but it makes your driveway more resistant to oil, gas leaks, power steering fluid, and it doesn't oxidize as quickly from the sun beating on it, which means it doesn't crack and break as easily. "

I was surprised to learn the sun does more damage to asphalt than winter salt and snow. Winter damage occurs when a driveway does crack and then ice gets into those cracks, expands and makes them worse.

Josh Dibble was helping Scott this morning at a residence on Vine Street.

Batavia Little League played a championship game at MacArthur Park on Wednesday. When I left, Batavia was ahead 7-1 or 8-1, but I've not yet received final results from anybody. Evan so, here are photos from yesterday's game.

UPDATE: Batavia won 9-4 and now advances to a sectionals round, which is hosted in Batavia this weekend. Teams in the tournament besides Batavia: Penfield, Auburn, Fredonia, Portville and Orchard Park.

Up until Friday, Melissa Broadbent thought her brother Bradley was really turning his life around.

He had a job, he was trying to do the best he could by his son, within the limits of court orders and the demands of the child's mother.

Then, seemingly overnight, and just three months removed from his last prison term, Bradley Broadbent discovered "Amped," a form of bath salts that is reportedly sold at a shop in Batavia.

"Previous to that day, he was doing well for himself," Melissa said. "He worked in a flower shop, he gained better employment, he was trying to become a good member of society."

Last Friday, Bradley thrust himself into local headlines when he climbed atop the roof of a home on Hutchins Street and then began jumping from roof to roof, yelling something about the police being after him.

He was taken by Mercy EMS to UMMC for evaluation, but that night, Bradley reportedly fled the hospital and went to his ex-wife's house on Tracy Avenue and entered her home.

That action led to a charge of burglary in the second degree.

"I don't believe anybody should be selling it," Melissa said. "For some people it’s a high, but for other people something doesn’t quite click and it’s not safe to us and the rest of the world."

If convicted of the burglary charge, it would be Bradley's third strike and mean from 20 years to life in prison.

And that's what has Melissa Broadbent most concerned.

She thinks the system has failed her brother. And the failure of the system, she said, was never more apparent than it was on Friday.

Melissa said when she came across Bradley that morning, she could tell he was high and learned from a friend that he had allegedly ingested bath salts, a substance for which she had no real prior knowledge.

She said she tried contacting her brother's parole officer, but he was on vacation and nobody from the parole office "bothered," as she put it, to call her back.

A call back and an effort to pick him up might have meant the entire Friday would have gone completely different for her brother, she said.

Then, after her brother was taken to UMMC, Melissa wonders why he was lightly restrained at the hospital. Melissa believes he should have been shackled by handcuffs so he couldn't escape until he came down off his high.

Then there's the issue of the burglary charge for entering his ex-wife's home.

"She was leaving a key in the mailbox for him," Broadbent said. "How was he supposed to know he wasn’t supposed to come in that day?"

Now that Melissa has gotten a quick personal and Google-search lesson in bath salts, she is perplexed why the substance is so easily available in Batavia and why anybody in good conscience would sell the substance to another human being.

"There's a chemical in it, a specific chemical, that makes you come out of your element and makes you do things you would not normally do," Melissa said. "It is not safe, not for anybody, not for the person doing it and nor for the person walking down the street.

"There's no way to test for it. People who want to find a mental escape, they're going to do it because it's legal and it's so easy to get. It needs to come off the street before somebody dies."

Bradley Broadbent was first arrested, she said, on a robbery charge when he was 16. He and a partner stole one dollar from a store and Broadbent spent eight years in prison.

When he came out, Melissa said, he was a changed person. He was anti-social, didn't know how to interact with people, distrusted everyone and was hostile to people he met for the first time.

The family wanted to help him, they said, so in the hope of getting him into treatment, they provided information to law enforcement that led to his arrest.  Rather than receiving treatment, however, she said Broadbent was sent back to prison.

"That didn't help him at all," she said. "That made him worse."

Now, with a possible third strike, Melissa is worried the system will once again come down hard on him and send him to prison for the rest of his life.

She hopes, somehow, someway, the system will do better than that by her brother.

"He is in need of mental care," Melissa said. "We know him. The people who know him, know he needs that. The system doesn’t know him. They don’t know he needs that and the system doesn’t care. That’s what I would like to see happen. My brother needs mental care. He needs help mentally. He doesn't know how to handle himself emotionally or mentally."

She isn't of a mind to sugarcoat any of the things Bradley has been accused of doing in the past. She just wants the best outcome for her brother.

"I don’t defend anything my brother has ever done," she said. "If he’s wrong, he’s wrong."

The rapid lessons in bath salts has made her very afraid of what the presence of the substance means for Batavia. She's worried -- more certain -- that not enough will be done soon enough about bath salts.

"It seems nothing ever gets done until it's the absolute worst and then people open their eyes and do something," she said.

Nicole Lang, the mother of another person whose life is allegedly being harmed by bath salts has said she's ready to set up a picket and a protest of a local shop allegedly selling the now controlled substance.

"I’m with her," Melissa said. "I’m all with her. The people selling this stuff, they’re not dealing with the consequences. Yet the people who love their family are the people who have been tainted by the effects of it."

Nearly every day of late, emergency dispatchers in Genesee County field multiple calls related to people getting into trouble or causing problems while apparently high on a substance benignly called "bath salts."

Area law enforcement officials recognize the problem, and even though most of the compounds known as bath salts are now a Schedule 1 Controlled Substance under federal law, the tools available to police officers to deal with these sometimes bizarre events are limited.

In the City of Batavia, Police Chief Shawn Heubusch said the approach his department is taking to deal with bath salt-provoked incidents is first a public safety issue.

"First and foremost, any responding officer is checking the welfare of people," Heubusch said. "First comes public safety, the safety of the people involved, checking to see if medical attention is needed, giving it to them."

If a crime has been committed, an individual under the influence of bath salts might be arrested, Heubusch said, but the first order of business is that person's health and safety.

However, since at a local level, the possession and even the sale of these so-called bath salts are legal, there isn't much local law enforcement can do to combat the spread of the drug.

But that doesn't mean any Genesee County residents or businesses that might sell bath salts should feel comfortable distributing the compounds outlawed as a result of legislation sponsored by Sen. Chuck Schumer.

The federal government's top law enforcement official in Western New York said today that investigators will respond to any complaints of the substances being sold locally, whether the complaints come in the form of tips from concerned citizens or media reports suggesting such sales are taking place.

"What the public can expect as with any reports of criminal activities is that law enforcement will look into it as appropriate," said William Hochul, U.S. Attorney for Western New York. "I can’t comment on specific cases, but the way we do our job in law enforcement is we look for possible violations of crime and we investigate it. If it rises to the level of a federal offense, we will prosecute."

Hochul praised The Batavian and Rochester's WHAM 13 for aggressive reporting on the bath salt issue during an exclusive interview with the two news outlets at the Sheriff's Office in Batavia.

"The public needs to be aware that the side effects of these substances is that to an extent they can be deadly," Hochul said. "We've had any number of episodes where people have acted violently, or they've gone into cardiac arrest, and that's just what we know. There's a long-term effect that still remains to be seen. So, the best defense, as with most drugs, is for the public to get educated."

Schumer's legislation bans MDPV (methylenedioxypyrovalerone) and mephedrone, the active ingredients in bath salts.

Reportedly, the chemicals found in bath salts cause effects similar to those of cocaine and methamphetamine, including hallucinations, paranoia and suicidal thoughts.

In Batavia in recent cases, people have climbed on rooftops, waved knives at people in a threatening manner, claimed to be attacked by ghosts, reported hearing gunshots and have been combative toward medical personnel during emergency responses to deal with their seizures.

Family members of individuals reportedly on bath salts have said that users  expressed suicidal thoughts and engaged in self-destructive behavior.

The paranoia, violence and self-destructive thoughts of people on bath salts are a safety concern for the public and emergency personnel, local law enforcement officials say.

"People using these substances are sometimes unpredictable and sometimes become violent," Heubusch said. "The officers do a great job of limiting contact with these people and ensuring everybody is safe."

Sheriff Gary Maha said fortunately, no situations involving his deputies have gotten out of hand, but officers have been responding to numerous medical calls involving bizarre behavior.

"Our officers are trained to protect themselves," Maha said. "It doesn’t matter what type of situation. It can be a dangerous situation. This person could have a knife he’s swinging around or whatever and they will have to take appropriate action to protect themselves and protect the public.

"We haven’t come across a situation yet where an officer needs to use a Taser, but our officers are armed with Tasers and trained in using them," Maha added.

Det. Rich Schauf said that with all the information available now about bath salts, and the fact that it says right on many packages, "not for human consumption," the real question is, why are people using them.

"The unfathomable situation in all this is why would somebody do this to themselves," Schauff said.  Why would somebody ingest something that they don’t know what it is. ... that's the real question: How do you stop somebody from hurting themselves?"

While that may be a question without an answer, Hochul's office is taking seriously the issue of enforcing the new ban on bath salts and synthetic marijuana, he said.

"We will now be able to treat bath salts the same way we treat cocaine and heroine," Hochul said. "(We can) use all of our federal techniques that we have available, including wiretaps, undercover operations, and hopefully bring these cases to closure much easier and much more successfully."

Up until the new ban was signed into law by President Barack Obama, federal law enforcement had very limited tools to combat bath salts and synthetic marijuana.

The chemicals used to manufacture these drugs were part of a DEA emergency schedule as controlled substances, but that only meant that law enforcement had to prove in a court of law that a person selling the substance did so with the intention they would be used for human consumption and that the effect of the substances was in fact similar to that of meth or cocaine.

That all changed on Monday.

"It’s much better for the community to know now that the substances are -- no ifs, ands or buts -- illegal to possess, to sell or posses with intent to sell," Hochul said.

While law enforcement officials take seriously the apparent increase in bath salt-related calls, they also say it shouldn't be overstated as some sort of community epidemic.

The majority of calls, according to Schauf, involve the same people repeatedly, and those calls are generally confined to people who have had law enforcement contact prior to bath salts becoming an issue.

Heubusch agreed.

"I don’t believe this is a widespread, mass hysteria type of event," Heubusch said. "It does seem to be a small group of people."

The other factor that may contribute to bath salts being part of a greater consciousness in Batavia, Schauf said, is more people understand what bath salts are and what they do, including cops and medical personnel.

"We might have been dealing with this before and we didn't know it," Schauf said. "Now that it's identified, you have this effect of everything is bath salts the minute you see somebody who is irrational."

All of the law enforcement officials we talked to today also said bath salts are just the latest fad drug. They pointed to either Ecstasy, PCP, sniffing glue, meth and even LSD as "fad" drugs of the past that eventually stopped being a common problem.

"We've seen different peaks and valleys in the past," Maha said. "We've seen LSD and we don't see that much anymore, or PCP, and we don't see that much anymore. They have all come and gone and hopefully this will as well."

What worries law enforcement officials that while federal -- and even possibly, someday, state legislation -- might outlaw bath salts as we know them today, there are probably chemists somewhere trying to cook up the next intoxicating brew.

"We have to be concerned about it," Hochul said. "I read one report that said this (the new law) is like raising the wall a little higher as the floodwaters grow. We certainly hope at a certain point that there won't continue to be creation of illegal substances, but given the advances in science and the willingness of people located throughout the world to try and make money through the selling of illegal drugs, it’s reasonable to assume there will be continued efforts to avert this law."

Hochul had two other bits of advice for community members who are concerned about bath salts.

First, if people plan to picket -- as Jason Lang's mother suggested doing -- an establishment suspected of selling bath salts, they shouldn't worry that such action would interfer with a federal investigation.

"If you’re a mother or a parent with concerns, you still have to do what you have to do to protect your family within the bounds of the law," Hochul said.

"We have an obligation to investigate violations of the federal law using all of our tools and there are ample tools to investigate the fact that somebody may be illegally selling drugs," Hochul added. "If somebody is protesting on the one hand, they should not be worried that would impede our ability to use one of our other tools to investigate violations of federal law."

The second bit of advice was directed at any landlords who might be leasing property to a business that could be selling bath salts.

The property can be seized under the federal forfeiture law.

If a judge determines the property owner knew a business was selling a controlled substance -- and media reports indicating such transactions were allegedly taking place -- a judge could rule the property owner should have taken action to ensure such sales were not being conducted on his property.

"If the landlord wants to keep his property, the landlord's obligation should be to make sure there’s no illegal activity occurring on his property," Hochul said. "That’s another advantage of having very assertive media in exposing this to the public at large. What did the particular owner know and when did he know it?"

Heubusch and Hochul also said the entire community has a role to play in combating bath salts in Batavia.

Community members, they said, need to call the police about suspicious activity, cooperate in investigations and educate each other about the dangers of these chemicals and compounds.

"This is a perfect opportunity for the community to come together and help others out," Heubusch said. "Whether they call us, they call 9-1-1 to report a suspicious event, or when the officer does arrive, report what they saw to that officer. ... We will do what we can to protect this community, but we do need help from the community itself."

PHOTOS: Top, Chief Shawn Heubusch; first inset, U.S. Attorney for WNY William Hochul; second inset, Sheriff Gary Maha.

This story was produced in conjunction and cooperation with The Batavian's official news partner, WBTA, and Sean Carroll, reporter for WHAM 13 in Rochester.

Related stories:

• Batavia Police Plan To Deal With The Trend Of "Bath Salt" Use (WBTA)
• Home : News : Top Stories Batavia Police Eye Plan Of Attack To Combat Bath Salt Use (WHAM 13)