Some things change, others don't; in this case, I'm interested in the change

The recent arrest of the junkie who sold another junkie a fatal dose of fentanyl isn’t particularly newsworthy, because that’s what drug addicts do, and how they die, and also because the “victim”, one Parker Ross of NoPo Riverside, had himself previously served time for selling and administering a near-fatal injection of heroin to another Greenwich resident.. So, entirely predictable and, although Ross’s death was surely mourned by those who loved him, for those uninvolved, it’s more of a not-so-particularly-sad tale than a tragedy.

Drug dealer

drug dealer, felon, and now-deceased Mr. Parker Ross

What caught my interest in this incident is that, while poking around the dead man’s criminal history — Ross was in and out of prison all his adult life for crimes ranging from intimidation, to assault, to possession of a firearm by a felon to, oh yes, drug dealing — I discovered this article on his arrest for posting threatening, anti-semitic messages on Facebook from way back in 2010. What an innocent time, but clearly, that time was ending.

The article quotes then-Lt. Kraig Gray (who would eventually rise to Deputy Chief and retire after 32 years of service in 2024) on the arrest, and the future:

Gray said with Facebook and other social networking sites becoming so popular, they are more likely to become part of criminal investigations.

"Police have to move with the times and that may involve interactions taking place over the Internet," Gray said. "Police have to be aware of what is going on there as well."

Fifteen years later, drug addicts and their inevitable fate remain unchanged, but the social media world has not.