Waves of overdoses just keep coming in Bloomington

About 2:30 Sunday afternoon, passers-by out on a breezy summer day, among them incoming Indiana University freshmen and their parents attending orientation programs, stepped around a transient man. He was splayed on the sidewalk, paramedics rendering aid. Witnesses told police the 33-year-old man had been sitting there on a bench, then fell to the ground, foaming at the mouth. An ambulance took him to IU Health Bloomington Hospital, where he was treated in the emergency room. Police issued a public intoxication citation to him and sent him on his way.

Over five hours on Saturday, emergency responders were summoned to the Kirkwood area for likely drug overdoses seven times between 3:50 and 8:53 p.m.

People with no place to go, their belongings piled in shopping carts, have left downtown parks because of increased police presence. They have moved to the sidewalks and the lawns of churches and businesses. Many of the 911 calls send officers to 213 E. Kirkwood Ave., the headquarters of Monroe County’s Habitat for Humanity, which provides affordable homes.

The Herald-Times reviewed police reports and court records to offer a glimpse into what visitors encountered this past weekend on one of Bloomington’s main streets through downtown that ends at Indiana University’s Sample Gates.

Case No. B17‑24701: Intoxicated person

3:50 p.m. Saturday.

South Washington and East Fourth streets.

Officers responded to a report of a man on the sidewalk who possibly had overdosed. They found a 23-year-old man lying down, a smoking device and lighter in his hand. He denied taking anything illegal. He was taken by ambulance to the hospital and was issued misdemeanor citations charging him with public intoxication and possession of paraphernalia.

Since 2011, he has been arrested on charges of domestic battery, possession of a synthetic drug and possession of paraphernalia.