The Montana Standard: Bakken busted: Tester, drug czar, others meet to address drug crime in oil patch

Jails in the Bakken area are overbooked and law enforcement is maxed out as drug-related crime surges in Montana and North Dakota oilpatch communities.

Deputies, prosecutors and local drug counselors made the case Friday for more federal help during a Glendive meeting with Federal Drug Czar R. Gil Kerlikowske and Sens. Jon Tester, D-Mont, and Heidi Heitkamp, D-N.D. All agreed that a massive influx of some 20,000 to 30,000 well-paid oilfield workers was bringing new criminal challenges to a region so rural it’s often characterized as frontier.