A total of 19 people were indicted in connection with drug trafficking organizations that operated in West Baltimore, in a community where three mass overdoses were reported in the past six months, the city state's attorney's office said Friday.

In July, two separate mass overdose incidents in Baltimore's Penn North neighborhood sent nearly 32 people to the hospital. In early October, seven people were hospitalized after police reported that 11 more people had overdosed in the same neighborhood.

"The concentration of Drug Trafficking Organizations in the Penn North Area is not only unacceptable from a quality of life standpoint, but it is also extremely dangerous, as evidenced by the ongoing violence and overdoses in that neighborhood," State's Attorney Ivan Bates said in a stat

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