Pubdate: Tue, 01 Aug 2006
Source: News-Tribune (LaSalle, IL)
Copyright: 2006 News-Tribune
Contact:  http://www.newstrib.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/3808
Author: Tom Collins, Senior Reporter
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/coke.htm (Cocaine)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/heroin.htm (Heroin)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/youth.htm (Youth)

FORMER AREA HANDYMAN SAYS HE BECAME HOOKED ON FIRST TRY

Editor's Note: Five inmates serving prison sentences for 
methamphetamine crimes agreed to talk to the NewsTribune about meth 
in the Illinois Valley. This is the second part in a four-part series.

VIENNA, Ill. -- As soon as the toolboxes were put away for the night, 
Jim Springs would see his fellow laborers pass drugs around -- a lot of drugs.

The 20-year handyman always declined offers to try them, mindful of 
how his brother, Tony, became addicted to crack cocaine. But while 
fixing hail-damaged roofs in La Salle-Peru, Springs' curiosity got 
the better of him.

Knowing methamphetamine worked as an aphrodisiac -- and having a 
steady girlfriend to experiment with -- Springs accepted an offer to 
try it. He was immediately hooked. Within six months, his life came 
completely unraveled and he went to jail.

"It will destroy your life from the day you pick it up, because you 
won't set it down," Springs, now 39, said during an interview at 
Shawnee Correctional Center, where he is serving a 10-year sentence. 
"I'd only been using for about six months, but the day I started, I 
didn't stop. As soon as I tried it, it was on. I used it 'til I got caught."

Springs, a native of Paducah, Ky., had come to Peru in 2004 to do 
roof work in the Illinois Valley. He left Kentucky with a crew of 
five, rented a room and quickly warmed to the Illinois Valley. He 
began dating a Peru woman, scrapped the idea of returning to Paducah 
and considered buying a place in the Illinois Valley.

He knew about meth; his home state of Kentucky is "thick with it" and 
he knew the dangers. But Springs was 38 years old and loved the 
youthful energy the drug gave him.

"I was almost 40 and I needed it to keep up with these younger 
people," he said. "It made me feel younger. Then it made me feel 
older. Then it made me look older. And then it took my life.

"It starts taking its toll on your mind and your body," he said. "You 
start hallucinating. You start being paranoid about people. You don't 
trust anybody. I love to work -- I've always loved to work -- and it 
took that away from me. It destroyed my life and it brought me here."

Though heroin remains the Illinois Valley's scourge, methamphetamine 
has finally migrated to North Central Illinois from Missouri and 
southern Illinois. Meth labs have popped up in recent years and while 
police and prosecutors say the illegal stimulant has yet to reach 
epidemic proportions, recovering addicts warn that it is as addictive 
as heroin.

Springs is something of a rarity among local meth users, insofar as 
he hadn't used any illegal drugs previously. And unlike most meth 
addicts who produce the drug in makeshift labs, he was earning 
upwards of $300 a day in the building trades and usually had the cash 
to simply buy meth in bulk quantities of $900 per ounce (28.35 grams) 
- -- a bargain price considering meth typically fetches $80-$100 a gram.

"I had money; I didn't have to steal for it," Springs said. "Kids 
that don't have any money and try it, there's no telling what they'll 
do for it. I'm a grown man and it done me like that."

Various Web sites and online resources indicate that meth is gaining 
a foothold among people who might otherwise use conventional 
stimulants, such as caffeine, to avoid fatigue: college students, 
truck drivers, physicians and attorneys.

Brian Vescogni, assistant La Salle County public defender, said he 
hasn't encountered users who got hooked cramming for finals. Most, he 
said, were turned onto meth after trying other illegal drugs. Then 
again, meth has yet to root itself in the local drug culture.

"I think that once it's here, you're going to have experimental 
people doing it," Vescogni said.

Springs began his meth use for recreation and smoked it in makeshift 
pipes of tin foil. Soon he was snorting meth and finally injecting it 
with a syringe.

"That's when my life went to hell," he recalled. "Snorting it makes 
you feel real good. Smoking it takes a little longer, but then you 
start getting paranoid. And when you inject it, you don't trust 
nobody. You see shapes and shadows moving, and you think people are 
around you and stuff."

At the peak of his addiction he was shooting an eyepopping gram at a 
time every 45 minutes. A week's pay would get him about 42 grams of 
methamphetamine and he'd burn through it within days.

Among the byproducts of meth addiction is a loss of appetite and an 
inability to swallow. He wasted away from 180 to 130 pounds and his 
teeth began to chip and corrode from the involuntary grinding 
associated with the drug's stimulant effect.

Worst of all was the inability to sleep. He said he once went three 
weeks without sleeping a wink. The sleep deprivation brought on 
terrible hallucinations.

"I was miserable," he said. "You want to quit. You just want to die. 
You shy away from it, but within five or six hours, your body starts 
craving it again."

When the police raided his motel room on Dec. 9, 2004, it was almost 
a relief. Springs readily acknowledged that were it not for police 
intervention, he surely would have died. It was while in La Salle 
County Jail that he ate his first square meal in several weeks -- a 
burger and fries that he wolfed down.

"Jail food never tasted better," he laughed.

His relief was quickly tempered by the realization that he would be 
going to prison for a long time.

Strung out and hallucinating, Springs had begun shouting and creating 
a ruckus in his hotel room. Patrons at Peru's Homestead Inn called 
the police. When Springs' girlfriend let them in, there were syringes 
and a Tupperware bowl with 34 grams of meth visible from the doorway.

Springs still maintains that he never once made or produced meth and 
never sold it to anyone; the 34 grams were for his personal 
consumption and he'd have used it in a matter of days.

It didn't matter. Legally, his stash was more than enough for 
prosecutors to presume intent to distribute. He was charged with a 
Class X felony carrying 6-30 years with no possibility of probation. 
His situation worsened five days after his arrest when he received 
the news that his brother Tony succumbed to addiction and took his life.

"I wanted to die with him -- I really did," he said. "I wasn't 
thinking right at the time. I still wasn't fully over the crap I was 
putting in my body. So I couldn't think real proper and I took it 
real, real, super hard."

Tony's suicide filled Springs with a determination to get clean, but 
he would have to do it from inside a prison cell. Four months after 
his arrest, he pleaded guilty March 23, 2005, to one count of 
unlawful possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver. 
He took 10 years.

"They slammed me," he said, acknowledging a prior conviction for a 
weapons offense. "They figured, 'He ain't learned now, he ain't never 
going to learn -- old as he is.'"

Shawnee Correctional Center is just an hour's drive from Paducah, 
enabling his parents and children to visit and lend their support. 
His father, a builder of barges, has offered to put him to work when 
he is paroled in 2009.

"I have to build my trust with my father," Springs said. "He doesn't 
understand why I did this, and it really devastated him. He keeps his 
guard up with me now, and I don't blame him."

Shawnee is a high-medium security facility and he hopes to eventually 
persuade prison officials to move him to a lesser security facility 
or perhaps to Sheridan Correctional Center, the state's designated 
addiction facility for felons.

 From what he's learned, the ammonia in meth has left behind a 
residue that affected his brain; he still doesn't trust people and 
still feels the effects of meth. His drug counselors think it could 
be years before he's fully recovered.

This much is clear: he's finished with meth for good.

"I'll never, ever try it again," he insisted. "I hate that stuff. 
Once I got away from it and cleaned up, as they call it, I hated it.

"Anybody even brings it around me, I might come back (to prison) for 
smacking them."

[Sidebar]

Loss of appetite one of first signs of meth addiction

Parents and guardians of teenagers and young adults should be on the 
lookout for a loss of appetite and accompanying weight loss.

Police and meth addicts told the NewsTribune that one of the salient 
symptoms of meth addiction is an inability to eat food, thanks to the 
appetite-suppressant properties of meth and difficulty swallowing.

"If they're shying away from meals every time, there's something 
wrong," said James Springs, a Peru man serving 10 years for 
methamphetamine possession.

Meth addicts initially show unwarranted confidence and seemingly 
boundless energy, but then suffer mood swings. Parents should also 
watch for sudden, alarming changes in behavior such as not meeting 
curfew, openly rebellious behavior, and signs of agitation such as 
fidgeting, nail biting and teeth grinding.

As addiction advances, meth addicts who go days without sleep also 
will begin hallucinating and demonstrating paranoia.

"If kids are on meth and they're paranoid, parents are going to know 
about it," said Brian Cain, another inmate serving six years for 
meth. "There's no way to hide it."

Cain recalled that when he was ingesting meth he would see alarming 
shapes amid the trees. Try as he might, he could not keep his 
hallucinations from those around him.

"Somebody would be there sitting around and I didn't want them to 
know anything about it, but I just couldn't help it," Cain said. Over 
time, addiction will lead to poor hygiene. Meth can leave people 
strung out for days, and they may not bathe or brush their teeth.

Parents should also keep an eye on the addict's skin, as well. Master 
Sgt. Bruce Liebe, methamphetamine program coordinator for Illinois 
State Police in Springfield, said addicts often hallucinate that 
their skin is crawling with insects -- "crank bugs" in drug parlance.

"They'll pick at a spot until it's raw and bleeding and they'll do 
this in several spots."
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MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman