Source: The StarLedger, 1 Star Ledger Plaza, Newark, NJ 071021200
Contact: "The use of heroin has surpassed the use of cocaine." MARIO FINKELSTEIN,
attending psychiatrist, University Hospital, Newark
Heroin hitches a ride to suburbia
New addicts more likely to snort than shoot up
By Lisa Peterson
STARLEDGER STAFF
Three years ago, at 18, he was a robust 180pound star of the high school
wrestling team in his suburban New Jersey community. He played in a band and
was thinking about pursuing a career in music.
Now he's a college dropout, 40 pounds thinner and a heroin addict.
The Hightstown resident who asked that he be identified only by his first
name, Anthony is trying to get clean now.
Anthony is representative of the newest, fastestgrowing population of
dopers: white, suburban, middleclass and heavy into heroin, once the
province of the innercity poor.
The purity of the heroin that recently became available allows it to be
smoked or snorted instead of injected. Most suburbanites don't associate the
heroin they sniff to the stuff that junkies cook, load into syringes and
shoot into their veins.
U.S. government figures show emergencyroom visits related to heroin
overdoses more than doubled in the six years through 1995 to 11,000 from
5,400. In New Jersey, 25,888 people sought treatment during 1995 for heroin
problems, according to John Farrell, deputy director of the state Division of
Addiction Services.
"The use of heroin has surpassed the use of cocaine," said Mario
Finkelstein, an attending psychiatrist at University Hospital in Newark. "It
has a high level of purity. People are able to snort it or smoke it, as
opposed to the heroin of the '60s and '70s, but
PHOTO BY ED CURRY
Anthony, who's been trying to kick his addiction with methadone, represents
the newest, fastest growing population of dopers: white, suburban,
middleclass and heavy into heroin, once the province of the innercity poor.
it's going to increase the amount of intravenous drug users" because of its
addictive nature.
"It's a more generally accepted drug because the new users aren't using the
intravenous drug route at first," said Linda Chapman, program director of
addiction treatment at Elizabeth General Medical Center. "And based on its
availability, I would say it's aging to be up there (in popularity) for a
while.
"It's almost more available than alcohol. There's been a crackdown on
selling alcohol to young people."
Last week, a 16yearold boy from a rich Randolph Township family was in
the intensive care unit of a hospital after allegedly using heroin.
Last month, a 15yearold former Parsippany Hills High School student was
found dead in his bedroom, apparently from a heroin overdose.
Earlier in March, an 18yearold Toms River High School student was arrested
on aggravatedmanslaughter charges following a hitandrun accident that
killed an 8yearold Newark boy. Police say the youth was speeding though the
neighborhood after he had purchased heroin.
"It's not uncommon to see young people doing it anymore. I've detoxed
teenagers who are 18, 17 and 19 who've had years' experience" with the drug,
says Chapman.
Randolph Police Lt. Lloyd Hendersonadds, "Now we're having this resurgence
in heroin and it's not limited to innercity or lowincome children."
Farrell, from the state Division of Addiction Services, notes heroin is "the
chic drug of choice now. . . We're seeing it in the suburbs and across the
state in terms of treatment."
Sandor Swidler, a drug and alcohol counselor at the Saint Barnabas
Behavioral Health Network in affluent Livingston, said he has seen the
population of middle and upperclass heroin users quintuple since he began
working there seven years ago.
He said middle and upperclass prospective users snort because of the
stigma and fear of the needle that AIDS helped intensify.
"Heroin had always been a drug you inject," Swidler said. "In the late '60s,
when it was considered an epidemic, it was 3 to 5 percent pure. Now it's
between 50 and 70 percent pure so you're able to sniff it and get really
high."
Boredhousewife syndrome
Swidler noted: "People are starting to use it at 38 now. You would have
never heard that seven years ago. It's not uncommon to do some marijuana,
shots of tequila and a line of heroin. Ten years ago that would have been a
line of cocaine.
"Cocaine was even considered safe for a long time, but heroin was still
considered hard because it had to be injected. I can't tell you the amount of
middleclass housewives we're treating now with heroin problems.
"It starts out as they're cooking. They're sipping a glass of wine, then it
becomes a whole bottle, then they develop a problem. They're bored they can
afford it, they can get it."
But, Swidler noted, "probably the biggest increase has been among
adolescents. There are a tremendous amount of students using it."
Swidler said that making heroin much mote potent "was a great marketing
technique."
Farrell added: "In my opinion, it's more pure now in order to compete with
the crack cocaine marketplace of years ago. Cocaine had not been the drug of
choice in urban communities because it was too expensive. The price dropped as
crack cocaine, which is more powerful. People started using crack cocaine in
lieu of heroin, and HIV became a problem with injecting drug users." Heroin
producers "had to increase the purity levels to stay competitive."
Comparing drugs
HEROIN COCAINE
Drug made from morphine, an What it is Drug made from leaves of
active chemical in opium. coca shrub of South America.
Relieves pain and brings What it does Stimulates the nervous sys
sleep. Feeling of joy or relief tem, increasing heart rate and
provides escape from reality. blood pressure. User feels
alert and powerful, and think
ing seems clearer.
Repeated use causes physical Dependence Effects wear off quickly,
and psychological depen depression sets in, and anoth
dence. Withdrawal symptoms er dose is often desired. Long
include body aches, diarrhea, term use can be extremely
muscle cramps and nausea. habitforming.
About $10 on the street for a Cost About $10 for a vial, which
bag, which weighs about .015 weighs about .O7 grams.
grams and is more powerful
than a similar amount of
THE STARLEDGER
SOURCE: Elizabeth Police Department; World Book encyclopedia
'It may be my son'
Edward Higgins, executive director of the Jersey Shore Addiction Services
Inc. rehab program in Asbury Park, said, "When you have high quality heroin on
the streets that you don't have to use by injection, the last stigma of heroin
is dropped the needle. Then, instead of the problem being in the cities
somewhere, people find out it may be my son, or my daughter."
Higgins added: "The Colombian cartels are adaptable. They stopped growing
coca and changed to poppy. By '89 to '90 we became aware of a flood of high
grade heroin."
Parents can't even take comfort in the hope their children will be scared
straight after going to highcrime, povertystricken neighborhoods to get
heroin.
People from Berkeley Heights to Toms River are going to the worst sections
of Newark, Trenton and Philadelphia to make their buys.
"It amazes me," Swidler added, "Whether you're from Short Hills or Newark,
you're going to buy your drugs in the same place." Swidler said some dealers
in minority neighborhoods will make sure white customers aren't hassled when
they visit.
In Newark, where in three months beginning last November police reported 663
drug arrests in the South Ward alone, 30 percent of the buyers were from the
suburbs. Swidler said of police: "There's just so much they can do with"
suburban users who get caught. Some just are told by cops and judges never to
return to the city for more drugs, Swidler said.
One dealer who works out of Newark and sells bundles (10 bags) and bricks
(five bundles, or 50 bags) to white, suburban heroin purchasers every day said
he can turn a profit of $4,000 a week.
The dealer, who did not want to be identified, said he provides protection
for his suburban gold mine. He gives street addicts a few bags of heroin to
help protect his buyers from people in the neighborhood.
"Why would I rob them when I can make a fortune from them?" he asked.
He added that a lot of his customers are professionals who work in downtown
Newark and drive up in expensive cars, wearing suits and ties, to buy heroin.
Chapman said her rehab clients have included pilots, lawyers and "a lot of
teachers."
Nightmare alley
Anthony, the 18yearold addict from Hightstown, said he still doesn't know
why he began using heroin, he just knows it is hard to stop.
He has been attending a methadone treatment center. "A lot of my friends are
here now," he said. "And for something like that to come out of my town ...
There was nowhere within 30 miles of my town to get heroin ... We had to go to
Philly."
Anthony said his friends' introduction to heroin was similar to his. He
smoked pot through high school.
"I drank, but not as often as I smoked pot. Then in my senior year in high
school I messed around with coke, mushrooms all psychedelics. My senior
year, I was down in Philadelphia buying coke and a dealer on the street asked
me about 'Nightmare.'"
Nightmare, Tombstone, Death and other prophetic names are commonly stamped
on heroin as a kind of dealer's trademark.
"I bought one bag, opened it up and saw the white powder I had seen in the
movies. I kept it, kind of daring myself to do it," Anthony recalled.
After a couple of weeks he sniffed half of the bag when he was alone.
"It didn't hit me for 10 minutes; I thought it was a beat" that is, that
he had been cheated "so I sniffed the rest of the bag. I couldn't move, and
I felt like I had the flu times 10."
He swore he would never try it again, but a month and a half later he was
back in Philadelphia. He was looking for cocaine, but he bought Nightmare.
He began enjoying it, Anthony said, or at least the "adventure" involved in
getting it in either the slums of Philadelphia or on the streets of Newark.
"Here I was, this white, middleclass kid going to the inner city and coming
out with drugs and money to spare," Anthony said. "I felt cool."
Eventually he was using six bags a day.
"I liked it a lot, then I lost all feeling to do anything and I just wanted
the dope in my hands," Anthony said. "I would do anything to get it, or sell
anyone to get it." He hocked his radios, his presents. "My mother would ask
what happened to them and then she'd forget."
About six months ago he overdosed by shooting eight bags. His sister, mother
and grandfather found him on the living room floor, foam coming out of his
mouth and blood coming out of his nose. He said he was trying to kill himself.
The police test
Ronald, the 20yearold son of a wealthy New Jersey businessman said he was
cocky enough after his visits to his Philadelphia heroin dealer that he would
actually look for a cop to see whether the officer could tell he was high.
"I'd ask him what time it was or something and would tell him I was studying
law," added Ronald, who asked that his real name not be used.
Eric, 28, grew up in a white, rniddleclass Newark family and lives in
Bloomfield; he works as a laborer. He took his first hit from a marijuana
joint at a party when he was about 12. At that age, he already was drinking an
occasional beer with the consent of his father.
"It was peer pressure," Eric said of drugs. "I didn't want to feel left
out." Eventually came cocaine and mescaline. At 17, he began sniffing heroin,
later shot it, and at the peak was doing 22 bags a day. He's still trying to
pull away from the grip heroin began to exert on him as a teenager.
After several tries, he stayed off heroin for five years, then relapsed. He
has been clean now for a month and a half, he says.
Asked what he would say if his new baby son or another member of his family
came to him one day and said they had tried heroin, Eric said he would advise:
"If it's your friends giving it to you, they're not really your friends.
Most of my friends are dead."