Pubdate: Mon, 02 Apr 2007
Source: Enterprise, The (MA)
Copyright: 2007 The Enterprise
Contact:  http://enterprise.southofboston.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/3231
Author: Maureen Boyle, Enterprise staff writer
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/heroin.htm (Heroin)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?132 (Heroin Overdose)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/youth.htm (Youth)

Series: Wasted Youth

OD TURNS MOM'S LAUGHS TO TEARS

With her eyes looking to the heavens, Patricia Peters walked behind 
her 23-year-old daughter's casket as "Amazing Grace" echoed through 
the Weymouth church last week.

Today, the Rockland mother is looking ahead, hoping her daughter's 
heroin overdose death will stop others from using the drug.

"The message we have to get to the young kids is this is not a 
recreational drug," Peters said.

Several groups are now sponsoring a forum at Bridgewater State 
College on Thursday to educate people about opiates -- such as heroin 
- -- and other drugs that are claiming the lives of teens and young 
adults throughout the region.

"We need to help educate parents and arm them with as much 
information as they can get," said Joanne Peterson, founder of Learn 
to Cope (learn2cope.org), a parents support group.

The forum, starting at 7 p.m., will feature former addicts, parents 
and speakers from drug-treatment programs. The forum is scheduled to 
be held at the school library, but the venue could be moved to a 
larger building.

"You have to shed light on this problem," Bridgewater Lt. Christopher 
Delmonte said. "If there is a problem, burying your head in the sand 
isn't going to solve it."

The seminar comes in the wake of an Enterprise four-day series 
detailing the damage done locally by opiate addiction called "Wasted Youth."

Nearly 100 people have died of opiate overdoses since 2004 in the 
area, The Enterprise reported.

Also, from 2003 to 2005, 2,682 people from area communities were 
treated in emergency rooms for opioid-related abuse, dependency or 
poisoning, according to the Massachusetts Division of Health Care 
Finance and Policy.

Delmonte said parents need to know the signs of drug abuse -- and 
then step in quickly.

"Nobody ever thinks they will ever be in this situation," he said.

Patricia Peters never thought her middle daughter, a Girl Scout and 
Pop Warner cheerleader, would fall victim to heroin.

Kelly Molloy dreamed of becoming a fashion designer and took courses 
in that field at Massasoit Community College.

But then her daughter began using OxyContin. And when the OxyContin 
got too expensive, she turned to heroin -- the story of too many 
young addicts today, Peters said.

She was living in the Edwina Martin Recovery House on Main Street, 
Brockton, a halfway house, after going through treatment programs. 
She was clean for four months, Peters said.

Until sometime Saturday night, March 24 or early the next day.

Molloy left the house that Saturday at 4:39 p.m. to attend a meeting 
with another woman at a church in East Bridgewater. They returned at 
10:30 p.m. and Molloy took a urine test at 12:15 a.m.

Seven hours later, a counselor heard a commotion in Molloy's room, 
Lt. John Crowley, chief of detectives, said.

Molloy was found, unresponsive. She was taken to Caritas Good 
Samaritan Medical Center and later pronounced dead. A test found 
opiates and barbituates in her system, Crowley said.

Peters keeps close the memory of her last hours with her daughter, 
the night before she died.

"I was with her Friday night, we took her and three of her friends 
out to eat. She was wonderful. She looked great. She was happy. Her 
friends were laughing. They were very, very happy," Peters said.

Four days later, the laughter was replaced by tears at the funeral.

"You hope and pray that their friends will learn from this," said the 
Rev. William Salmon, who officiated at the funeral. "We live with the 
hope that she is at peace with God."
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MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman