A frank look into the world of drugs

Atikokan Progress
by Mike McKinnon
A drug enforcement officer and a recovering drug addict brought “the truth about drug use” to AHS students in a frank, hard-hitting presentation Friday, April 20.
Brian Brattengeier, a detective staff sergeant with the OPP and a 20-year veteran with the force, and Don Young, a former addict, enforcer and dealer - and now head of the Superior Points harm reduction program - were the messengers.
Det. Sgt Brattengeier, a unit commander with the Tri-Force Drug Unit, has spent ten years in drug enforcement, including four years undercover. (He was part of an undercover operation in Atikokan in 1992.) He also has first-hand experience with the havoc of addiction, having dealt with drug use and addiction within his family while growing up.
Young started doing drugs when he was 13, and that set off a chain that led him into addiction, dealing, homelessness, jail, extreme violence, and much more. He has brain damage as a result of about a decade of use and abuse. “I don’t have an off switch,” he said, noting that he was one of the ‘lucky ones’ - sooner or later, nearly all drug users end up dead as a result of their addiction.
“I don’t want you as my clients [at Superior Point],” he told the students. Three of his clients have died in the past few weeks, and another seven have been hospitalized.
The pair were adamant that there are no such thing as ‘soft’ drugs anymore. The marijuana “your parents knew” isn’t what is out there now. THC levels (tetrahydrocannabinol - the active ingredient in marijuana) today are far higher than they were even ten or fifteen years ago, thanks to plant breeding and large-scale grow operations. And additives like methamphetamines are often used to make marijuana more popular with users - and more potent and addictive.
That, in itself, in one of the major hazards of drug use: rarely, if ever, can you be sure of exactly what it is you might be taking.
The drug world is all about money. Addicts start dealing to support their habits, and pretty quickly lose any scruple about what they will do to feed their habit. In order to increase the profits on the drugs they sell, they add things (“step on them”) to make the volume greater. (“Hash oil? You’re lucky if all you are smoking is hash oil mixed with Vaseline or Vitamin E. If you’re not lucky, it’s hash oil mixed with used motor oil.” Crushed glass, and even low grade battery acid, are common additives to cocaine.)
They also mix drugs to increase their potency - both in the high they impart, and in their addictive power. (Brattengeier: “Cocaine costs $90 to $110 a gram in Thunder Bay. Methamphetamine [‘crystal meth’, which is far more addictive than even cocaine] costs about $3 a gram to produce.”)
Violence
Violence is an inevitable by-product of a world awash in illegal money and the need to feed an addiction.
“If you owe somebody money for drugs, get ready for violence,” Brattengeier warned.
“As a dealer, I never walked away from a debt. I couldn’t - it’s all about face,” said Young, who told a particularly horrific tale of the lengths he went to to collect. “I did a lot of stuff I am not proud of… but it was what I had to do to survive in the world I was living in.”
He also noted the link drugs have with the world of prostitution. A desperate addict will sell her or him self. Dealers know this, and take full advantage.
“I know of at least two 13-year-old prostitutes working the streets in Thunder Bay,” said Young. “I also know I could sell [just about any of] you to a Red Deer dealer for $40,000 worth of meth.”
Addiction
One of the most effective tools the pair presented were photos of drug users. Particularly telling was a series of 12 mug shots taken of a New York woman, now dead, over a seven year period. She was busted as a fresh-faced teen, and the succeeding mug shots painted a vivid picture of her descent into addiction and hopelessness. In the last, she looked like a 65-year-old, and yet was not even 25.
Others showed the ravages of injection drug use, and the impact of crystal meth on teeth - ‘meth mouth’ as its known (the caustic nature of the drug just destroys teeth). Another series showed the wasting effect drug use had on a woman (again, now dead) that Young knew. This relatively young woman had the body of a 70 or 80-year-old.
Crystal meth
Crystal meth has earned a horrible reputation - and richly deserves it.
“It is a hundred times more addictive than cocaine,” said Brattengeier. Many of the few crystal meth addicts who have survived to get clean recognize that their addiction started with their first use. That’s the power of this drug - one use can hook you.
“And the vast majority of those who use two or three times don’t think about [getting clean] again for five years,” said Brattengeier. By that time, their teeth have usually been destroyed, they’ve had to deal with police and jails, they’ve had to face drug debts and the ensuing violence….
Crystal meth is out there and available.
“It’s a totally soluble drug,” said Young. “It can be in anything.”
“And it’s here… it’s in your pot, your coke…” said Brattengeier. “You have about a 6% chance of getting off it once you are addicted. When you’re on meth, you’re done.”
The pair also offered insight into LSD (there is a particularly nasty version out now that contains strychnine), GHB, ecstasy, and Oxycontin and the related prescription meds. The session focused far more on the “unplanned consequences” of drug use - addiction and all that goes with it - than on the drugs themselves, however.
The choice
“We’ve shown you what it looks like,” Young challenged the students. “Are you willing to pay the price for your choices?”
“Open your eyes,” said Brattengeier. “Don’t do drugs. It’s up to you.”