Pubdate: Sun, 05 May 2002 Source: Register-Guard, The (OR) Copyright: 2002 The Register-Guard Contact: http://www.registerguard.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/362 Author: Larry Bacon Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine) METHAMPHETAMINE TAKES LIVES, DESTROYS FAMILIES JESSE ESTABROOK was a tough kid. He stood 6 feet 2, weighed 190 pounds and played linebacker on defense and fullback on offense for the Coquille High School football team. When he carried the ball, he would try to run right through anyone between him and the goal posts. "He loved contact," says his 78-year-old grandfather, Don Radford. "That was what he liked about football; you hit somebody and you don't get in trouble for it." Jesse lived with his grandfather and grandmother, Jean Radford, during his high school years. They loved him like their own son. They watched him play a lot of football and take a lot of hard hits. But none was as hard as the hit they took last Nov. 28 when a sheriff's deputy came to their home to tell them Jesse had died in a Coos County Jail cell at age 18. The deputy told the grandparents it was a seizure but they learned later that Jesse had been picked up on an assault charge that morning for punching somebody the night before. He was carrying some plastic bags filled with methamphetamine when he was arrested and, while sitting in the back of the patrol car, he ate the meth before officers could find it. An autopsy showed the contents of three to four bags in his stomach, an amount nearly 200 times that considered to be lethal. Jesse probably thought he was tough enough to swallow that much meth, Don Radford says, but he was wrong. In Search Of A 'High' Meth kills, as more and more people in Coos County and other parts of Oregon are finding out. And when it doesn't kill, it often destroys its abusers' lives and the lives of those around them. Methamphetamine has been part of the Coos County drug scene since the 1980s. Some speculate that people began turning to the drug when local timber and fishing jobs began to disappear and unemployment soared. Now, authorities say many of the children of meth abusers also are hooked on it. Meth is cheap, plentiful and easy to come by in Coos County. You can buy a quarter-gram bag - enough for one hit - for about $20. It's usually a powder that varies in colors from milkish white to yellow to light brown, and it has a strong chemical smell. It can be snorted, injected or, in chunk form, smoked. Those who have used it say the first use produces an intensely pleasurable rush and that the "high" from one dose can last up to 24 hours. With repeated use, users find that they need to use more and more to achieve the same rush. They switch to injections to get it into their bloodstream more quickly, and the injections become more frequent as they struggle to maintain their high. Abusers often binge to stay high for days at a time, injecting every two or three hours, never sleeping. They're full of seemingly boundless energy. Near the end of the binge comes a "tweaking" phase when aggression, paranoia or depression sets in. The body finally gives out and crashes, and the user might sleep almost around the clock for days at a time. Withdrawal follows the crash, along with depression, possible thoughts of suicide, and an intense craving for more meth. That craving can lead to more injections and start the cycle all over again. Extended use can lead to total dependency, former users say. " I needed it to survive," says Lisa Culver Lindsay, 36, of Coos Bay, who started using meth when she was 19 and managed to quit it for good after a year in jail that ended last October. "I couldn't get out of bed without it." Addiction Leads To 'Ugliness' Meth addicts lose weight and often look gaunt. They become indifferent about their personal appearance and the binge-and-bust cycle keeps them from holding down jobs, making it difficult for them to meet their family respon-sibilities. Drug enforcement authorities say methamphetamine can create addicts more quickly than most drugs and leads to criminal behavior because addicts often steal to support their habit or commit violent acts while tweaking. In his 25 years with the Oregon State Police in Coos Bay, Detective Dale Oester has seen a lot of the ugliness resulting from meth abuse. In addition to domestic disturbances and theft - first from family members, then from the larger community - it also triggers violent tendencies that lead to assaults and sometimes homicides, he says. People can also do "horrendous sexually deviant things" while under the influence of meth, he says, some of which involve children. Nancylee Stewart, a child welfare services manager with the state Community Human Services office in Coos County, says she has seen it all: a meth abuser's neglected 3-year-old child wandering down a major road, babies lagging in physical and mental development because their mothers used meth while pregnant, children exposed to toxic chemicals in meth labs, kids slapped around by parents who are tweaking. Seeing those kinds of things causes anger, grief and stress for people in her agency, Stewart says. What keeps child welfare workers going, she says, is the thought that they may be able to rescue such children, improve their lives, and maybe help meth-addicted parents shake their habit and put their families back together again. Sometimes, she says, the workers know that the happiest ending possible is to permanently remove children from a meth-shattered home and put them up for adoption. Support Groups Can Help Why do people start using a drug with such a potential for destruction? To get a new high. To escape an abusive relationship. To make up for some past hurt. Even to lose weight. Those are some of the reasons given by former users now participating in support groups to help them stay "clean." Lisa Lindsay quit meth and returned to it numerous times over the years. She gave up one of her babies to her mother and periodically lost two others to child welfare authorities. She said faith in God finally helped her get and stay clean. Two of her children remain with her. Lindsay helped start a faith-based support group at North Bend's Celebration Center, where she is a volunteer. Sexually abused as a child, she says methamphetamine initially "filled something inside me that nothing else filled." And when it didn't do that anymore, she found herself too addicted to quit. Emery Sutherland, 21, also of Coos Bay, just got out of prison after serving time for burglary and theft. He stole to support a meth habit developed at age 14. Now a member of the Celebration Center support group and one other group, he has vowed to stay clean. Sutherland was using marijuana when some friends urged him to try meth, and he says he loved being able to stay wired for days. It pains him now to realize that his meth use led him to cut his family out of his life for several years, develop a criminal record and do things totally out of character. He and a "crime partner" used to use billy clubs to beat people and steal their dope, he says, and sometimes while walking down the street, he would punch a stranger just for something to do. Jesse Takes A Wrong Turn No one is sure how long Jesse Estabrook had been involved with meth. Oester says he had been known to use illegal drugs and the amount of meth he ingested the day he died was consistent with what a dealer would have. Jesse was doing well in school and seemed to enjoy life, his grandparents say, until he injured his shoulder during his junior year and found out he couldn't play football his senior year. "He loved football," Radford says. "When he found out he couldn't play, he didn't care about nothin' or nobody. I never seen a kid go down like he did." The grandfather says he had been concerned that Jesse might be abusing drugs since he came to live with him at age 13. He asked Jesse about drugs, told him nothing good could come from them, even required him to take random urinalysis tests to detect drug use. Jesse was a good boy, the grandparents say, but he had a temper. One day last October, he became angry and threw a gallon of milk at his grandfather's feet. "It scared me," Radford says. He called the sheriff's office and had Jesse picked up. The young man went to court, and the judge ordered him to stay away from his grandparents' home. Although there was concern that he might be a danger to them, Radford says they didn't fear Jesse and wanted him back. Jesse started staying with friends, here and there, Radford says. He dropped out of Coquille High and opted for an alternative school to finish the one class he needed to graduate. The meth involvement may have started then, the Radfords say, as Jesse hung out more and more with "the wrong crowd." The fight that landed him in jail was apparently over remarks someone made about his girlfriend. When he was booked into jail, Jesse asked to see a jail nurse and told her he had eaten some bad mushrooms. He refused to let her take any of his vital signs, authorities said, and the jail staff decided to check on him every 15 minutes. About two hours after the checks began, he was found dead. The Coquille High gym was packed for Jesse's memorial service. The minister conducting the service urged the young people there to remember what happened to Jesse and to make the right choices about drugs. Members of this year's senior class, with whom Jesse would have graduated, will wear a pin bearing his picture on graduation day. The Radfords say that if anything good comes from his death, it will be to show the community's young people what drug abuse can lead to. They wholly support a growing community movement in Coos County to combat meth abuse and say it's about time. Tears welling in her eyes, Jean Radford asks, "How many more young people will we have to lose?" Related: Meth menace: A nonprofit agency is trying to fight the devastating drug - --- MAP posted-by: Beth