Pubdate: Mon, 04 Dec 2000
Source: USA Today (US)
Copyright: 2000 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.
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Website: http://www.usatoday.com/news/nfront.htm
Page: 26A
Author: Mel Maurer, Westlake, OH

ADDICTION HEALING IS KEY IN DOWNEY CASE

I'm not particularly a fan of actor Robert Downey Jr., but I can't help but 
feel -- given his apparent total helplessness with his addiction to drugs 
- -- that he alone is not to be blamed for the failure of the addiction's 
treatment (''The long, slow slide of Robert Downey Jr.: Hollywood is too 
much for actor, uncle says,'' Cover Story, Life, Wednesday).

If losing your family, your career, millions of dollars and all 
self-respect doesn't keep you from drugs, no time in prison will either.

Obviously something else must be done to help these people from committing 
suicide by nostril or injection. We don't put other mentally afflicted 
people in jail; why do we do it to these folks?

It seems, given Downey's celebrity, this may be an opportunity to treat him 
differently -- to cure him and to publicly establish a better way of 
handling this particular disorder. I hope whoever has jurisdiction over his 
case will take other approaches into consideration.

Mel Maurer

Westlake, Ohio
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