Toward the end of last October my son, William, was rushed
to the hospital after experiencing cardiac arrest. After six weeks of
hospitalization, during which he was in a coma, it became clear that he would
remain in a persistent vegetative state. We made the painful decision to remove
him from a respirator, and he died within 24 hours. The cause of his cardiac
arrest was a heroin overdose. Most
likely heroin foolishly combined with alcohol or benzodiazepines sufficient
enough to cause him to stop breathing and reduce the supply of oxygen to his
brain long enough to result in devastating brain damage.
Recently I came across an article in the New
York Post by Madeleine Scinto, Inside
the Lucrative World of Ecstasy Smuggling. The article details the manufacture of MDMA in labs hidden
in the woods on the east and west coasts of Canada, MDMA being the main
ingredient in Ecstasy. The product
is then smuggled into the U.S., where a single dealer, Ragan, grosses up to $45,000
a month for a few hours of work a day selling in New York City. Ragan works at the end of the line of a
$4 million a year business where the middlemen who transport and distribute the
drug in the tri-state area gross between $200,000 and $350,00 a month each.
When William died his mother, sister, and I determined to
create a fund in his memory “to educate and inform people about drug abuse and
its prevention, to provide ever more enlightened treatment for addicts, to help
make treatment options for addicts more readily available, and to remove the
stain of shame surrounding this disease.”
Friends have been exceedingly generous, and the fund continues to
grow. As donations continue to
come in we are encouraged and deeply touched. I often receive the report of the newest donation and am
moved to tears.
I read about Ragan and her confederates Nick and Chad and am
moved to anger. In the two months that our fund in memory of William has been
in existence we’ve raised a little more than half Ragan’s monthly gross. Make no mistake. Our family is exceedingly grateful for
what has been given in William’s name.
My anger and frustration come from the scale of the fight we’re engaged
in. This article happened to be
about Ecstasy. Add to that heroin,
cocaine, methamphetamines, pills, plus whatever I’ve forgotten or remain
ignorant about. William, a
Manhattanite, spent some time in rehab this past summer in a facility in
eastern Long Island. Nearly all
the people he was with were young adults like him, many from Long Island. One of his biggest discoveries was that
the Long Island addicts were getting their heroin via the same supplier, the
same brand, stamped and labeled on each ten-dollar bag. Someone who is surely
making more than Ragan, Nick and Chad.
I have no answers.
David against Goliath doesn’t begin to describe our fight. More like David against Goliaths. I do know that we remain committed to
using whatever resources we can muster: monetary, human, collective and individual
– to fight the disease of addiction.
To read the entire Post article,
go here: http://bit.ly/VshXEX
For information on the Where There’s A Will Fund: http://bit.ly/TbKu2M