Pubdate: Fri, 21 Jan 2005
Source: North Shore Sunday (Beverly, MA)
Copyright: 2005 Community Newspapers Inc.
Contact:  http://www.northshoresunday.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/3465
Author: Bob Gates and Frank Carini, Staff writers
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/heroin.htm (Heroin)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/oxycontin.htm (Oxycontin/Oxycodone)

HEROIN HORRORS

Lynn firefighter Timothy Lawrence lost his daughter, Kathleen, to a heroin 
overdose in 2003.

Jeff Allison, a Peabody High School graduate, was a first-round draft pick 
of Major League Baseball's Florida Marlins and bound for stardom as a 
top-notch pitcher. But Allison showed up late for spring training last 
year, and later that summer was rushed to a Lynn hospital after a heroin 
overdose.

Their stories attracted attention, especially Allison's, and before long 
other prominent and otherwise typical North Shore youngsters, including the 
son of a school superintendent and a football coach's kid, were revealed as 
addicts. It wasn't just a back-alley drug anymore.

"For every Jeff Allison, there are a thousand kids like him," says Lynn 
Police Officer Larry Wentzell, who works in the schools. "It isn't just 
about criminals and homeless people."

A packed gymnasium of educators, police officers, clergy, parents and 
others took a significant step together last week in battling the 
escalating toll of heroin, Oxycontin and other opiates in Essex County.

The gathering, arranged by District Attorney Jonathan Blodgett and Essex 
County Sheriff Frank Cousins, was the first of many public dialogues 
expected about dangerously addictive drugs that have killed dozens and 
hospitalized many more across the region in recent years ("Smackdown!," 
Sunday, Nov. 23, '03).

Five years ago, Essex County became one of 13 New England counties 
designated as High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas by the Office of 
National Drug Control Policy.

But why here? Why now?

Heroin has rattled the region for several reasons, says George Festa, 
director of the High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Area - high purity, low 
prices and effective marketing techniques.

"It truly is a horrific epidemic and a community problem," says Blodgett.

And when users graduate from snorting the drug to injecting it, says Rev. 
Rodney Hart, a recovered addict himself, the risk of getting HIV from the 
needle is no deterrent.

"The power of that drug is something that captures you," he says. 
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