Pubdate: Tue, 29 Nov 2005 Source: Wisconsin State Journal (WI) Copyright: 2005 Madison Newspapers, Inc. Contact: http://www.madison.com/wsj/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/506 Author: Susan Lampert Smith, Wisconsin State Journal Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/opinion.htm (Opinion) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mdma.htm (Ecstasy) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/heroin.htm (Heroin) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/oxycontin.htm (Oxycontin/Oxycodone) WHY DO WE HAVE TO LET DRUGS TAKE ANOTHER LIFE? To a grieving family, it must seem like too little, too late. Last week the Wisconsin State Journal reported that a man was convicted of reckless homicide for buying the heroin that killed 19-year-old Sarah Stellner. In February, the drug dealer who sold the OxyContin that killed Julie Zdeblick, 17, was sentenced to five years in prison. Can't we arrest these drug dealers before someone dies? That's what Waunakee grandmother Arlene Schmitz was thinking when she called Waunakee and Dane County authorities to report the person she believes sold OxyContin to her daughter. On Monday, her daughter checked in to the Huber Center to begin her sentence for driving under the influence, leaving behind a 3-year-old in the custody of relatives. The alleged dealer is still free. "I thought police were here to protect the public," Schmitz said. Schmitz said her daughter became addicted to the powerful narcotic painkiller after she was injured in a car accident and a doctor prescribed OxyContin. Schmitz said her daughter also began buying pills from a woman who had a prescription for the drug. The daughter was arrested for driving under the influence of OxyContin in January in Middleton, with her 3-year-old child in the car. She was arrested again in March when she passed out in her car. In the first case, Schmitz said her daughter was in a near coma, with dangerously low blood pressure, and spent four days hospitalized in intensive care. "What's it going to take?" Schmitz asked, "a death?" So why didn't police go after the dealer? Detective Steve Wegner, of the Dane County Metro drug unit, was blunt. "If we lived in Russia, we wouldn't have to verify information, and we could just go out and arrest people," he said. Wegner said the daughter wasn't willing to give the kind of evidence that would stand up in court. (Schmitz said her daughter did talk to police, but she didn't want me to interview her daughter directly.) "Pill cases are difficult," Wegner said, "because most people do have prescriptions. If they're prescribed OxyContin, you have to prove they took more than they were supposed to." Wegner said OxyContin is a growing problem, and seems to have replaced Ecstasy in popularity among teenagers. "We're seeing a lot more of it in the Madison area," he said. "Kids I see tell me they need it just to function. They pop a pill and go to school. Without it, they go through massive withdrawal." These cases are complicated. Police need witnesses who are willing to go make undercover buys from the dealer, testify in court, or reliable enough that they're able to make them into confidential informants. Anyone who knows addicts knows that reliability isn't their best quality. I don't think the police are wrong here, although I hope they keep an eye on the alleged dealer. But I sympathize with Schmitz. It's awful to watch addiction destroy people you love. You'd do anything to save them. And I hope that a year from now we're not writing a story about another death and another dealer being arrested when it's too late. - --- MAP posted-by: Steve Heath