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THE CURE FOR OPIOID ADDICTS: Kill Us! By, Robert G. Lockwood #8990_7-0j 2 FBOP Is there really a cure for the opioid epidemic? Some may believe so; others do not. In 1839 the Chinese empire did not. They ordered the British government to cease all imports of this highly distructive drug but England continued to supply the demand. China retaliated by impounding two and a half million pounds of British high-grade opium; burning it. The English attacked China with a huge armada of naval vessels consisting of 16 warships, four armed paddlers, two frigates; two river steamers, and troopships with 7,000 soldiers. Britain was serious and was not about to let a backwards society stop the lucrative opium trade. They opened fire on the Chinese navy; destroying it. They opened the river trade routes, and confiscated an island which became "Hong Kong." They physically forced the Chinese government to allow -- by treaty -- the importation of millions of pounds of opium. China tried to find a cure for the opium abuser to stem the demand; however, this failed, so they killed them. They killed them all! Chinese officials first started by arresting the drug dealers and strangled them to death. This was followed.by publicly executing any person found in the prisons with similar offenses. Basically, they killed anyone, and everyone who was somehow envolved with opium, including users. This ended China's opioid epidemic. The British traded in other commodities, and the world became a better place. (Information located in "The Opium War" by Brian Inglis). Unfortunately, millions not only died as a result of the strong addiction properties of opium, but large societies were destroyed. For example, during the foregone period; the supplier of the monopolized drug was India. One witness observed the ravages of this once prestigious country and thus stated; "depopulated this beautiful country, turned into a land of wild beasts, with which it. is overrun, and has degenerated the... people from a fine race to the most abject, servile, crafty and demoralised race... Once in the opium grip, there was nothing the native would do to secure supplies; he will steal, sell his property, his children, the mother of his children; and finally even commit murder." ( By Brian Inglis). Does the above sound familiar? Is history repeating itself? Is there a cure, or should society do what the Chinese did; kill us? Or lock us all up in prison for the rest of our lives? The above China example was an epidemic similarly the same as our current opioid crisis; the differences is that the China government killed all the users; our government has used mass incarceration. Thus, this essay is an alternative to mass incarceration, also to help curb the current opioid crisis; and future generations who may be tempted by the strong desire of opioid addiction. The bottom line is that something new needs to be done, because the current methods are not working. For example, the death rate of overdose is staggering with an increase of 425 percent since 1999. There has been 182,418 deaths from 1999 up to 2016 (The World Almanac, 2019, pg. 177). Perhaps we do not need to do anything, the overdose death rate will wipe out all the current Junkies anyway! But this is unethical, and the current death rate is only a small percentage of the overall opioid user. Another difference from the Chinese example is that the British Empire is not infesting our country with drugs like they did in China. Our own citizens do that! For example the Sackler Family -- who helped me relapse in 2010 -- owns Purdue Pharma LP. This family knew that the pill that they distributed called "OxyContin" was a highly addictive pain killer but marketed as a safe alternative less addictive than others; and, once they saw the profit margins, they distributed 4 billion dollars more to us (see, The Wall Street Journal titled article called "Lawsuits Bares New OxyContin Emails," by Sara Randazzo and Jared S. Hopkins). It is difficult not to get upset over. the fact that this pharmaceutical company flooded our country with a drug that has the same addictive properties as heroin. They should have just given us heroin because we all ended up addicted to it anyway! This is because the government placed tighter restrictions on OxyContin once they found out it was the same derivative of opium, thus, leaving no recourse for the addicted but heroin. My celly (cellmate) can testify to the fact on how easily assessible OxyContin was. He set-up pain centers that not only sold the OxyContin pills, but you could also purchase prescriptions. He claimed there were long lines in front of his multiple pain centers every morning with so called patient's waiting for their pills and/or prescriptions. He was convicted for distribution of 600,000 OxyContin pills, and claimed he sold a million prescriptions. It cost him 25 years in prison though. This is just one small example of the big picture, and why we now have an opioid crisis; once the OxyContin ran out, we became heroin addicts with six figure overdose death rates while robbing, stealing, and murdering. I do not wish to discuss at this time all the horrors I committed while a cold blooded opium addict. I do not wish to bore you with all the jails and prisons I have served in. But I will tell you this; opium makes you mean! It brings the demons out that you never knew you had. Therefore, I am haunted every single second of my life by the atrocious, and appalling behavior while I was an addict of opium. That being said; I was once a great kid who loved racing motorcycles from the age of 11 up to 18 years of age. I also loved my horses and rode with my girlfriend on the back. My friends and families were dear to me. But once addicted to opium, I became a monster and hated everyone around me, as they hated me; I destroyed everything I touched, and was plain mean! To give you an example of how mean we can be, read "Goering" by Roger Manvell. Goering was the second in command under Hitler during the Nazi campaign of World War Two. Goering was found during his arrest of two suitcases of opioids. He was an opium addict and was sentenced to death for the killings of millions! Is this not a good example of how mean we can be? Is there a cure for us? Perhaps there is a passive cure. It depends on how long you have been addicted, and what genre you are. I believe that most men with opium addiction problems only have a chance at a passive cure. Women may fair better than men because. they seem to have more will power. The scientific analysis can be summarized better by an interview I had listened to on NPR News. Ironically, I was listening to this program while in a punishment cell (SHU) for using drugs in a Federal Prison. However, the program was very informative, and to the point. The interview was attended by a Neuro-Scientist named Judith Grisel from Bucknell University. She stated; "What yo experience as a child effects dramatically your future, such as drug use.'' She further claimed that;,'.' Eighty. percent users have started before they reached the age of 14.Toe younger you start drugs, the better chance of being a long term user." She finished by saying the brain does not mature until the age of 25. So basically she is telling us, that we are doomed, and I believe she is correct. Perhaps there is hope for women, but I think us men should be as the victims of China; kill us! So as I said above, I believe there may be a passive cure for us. But first; I have been an opium user for over 40 years. How I have survived this long I cannot answer. I do not know why but I am in perfect health and do not have AIDS or Hepatitis. Maybe it is Gods will but I doubt it. Unfortunately, I live, while the worthy die! However, hopefully my experience may help others live longer, or live a productive life, and I at the age of 61; am experienced. For example, I know thousands of drug users and prisoners and have a thousand stories to tell on how each one of their lives could of been productive but for a single turning point in their lives. I also have personal experience from the first time I was convicted at the age of 13 for possession of dangerous drugs, up to the most recent drug relapse, and my current drug free life. I had to quit my latest drug relapse by kicking (stopping) cold-turkey (all at once). I decided to stop a long term Suboxone habit so I could write this essay. I could relapse again at anytime; us junkies are not very consistant. But what enspired me to write this is a sad story that put tears in my eyes. I have been a ruthless bank robber fool, been in high speed chases almost gettin shot, I have been shot, I have shot people, I have been in fights in which I put others on life support, I have almost been on life support, I was even implicated in a homicide in the 1970's; and one time I got high on drugs and decided to grab a shark by the tail while scuba diving; it turned around and just about bit me in the face! So I have been through a lot and have toughened up over the years; however, a sad story I read in the papers made me cry. I am so saddened by this event that I would gladly, give up my life for this poor 22 year old girl and the 2 year old daughter she left be hind. When you read about the numbers of deaths occurring from drug use, it is just print; not much personel feelings. But when you put the name of the persons death with those numbers, it is terrible. For example, Three days into an Arizona Detox center, pretty Madison Cross dies. She wanted to do the right thing and clean up for her two year old daughter; but is killed from a septic complication of acute bronchopneumonia in the setting of heroin toxicity. How horrible! She checked into Serenity Care Center which is a state licensed drug detox center in Phoenix, Arizona to be clean from drugs so she and her little daughter could live a new and fun life, but is now dead! This is why we need to do something. I also discovered that there has been 150 deaths in California alone since 2014 up to 2019 in detox treatment facilities.. There has been 44 deaths the first six months of this year in California at treatment centers. Would it be better just to give them suboxone and send them on there way alive? So if there is a cure for opium addiction, it is like playing Russian Roulette. Perhaps it is best to use the passive cure. First of all I am a strong critic of detoxing using drugs. I have been to four seperate clinics; failed all of them. Matter of fact, I came out worse. It does not take a rocket scientist to figure out that when you replace one drug with a worse one, it will explode. However, I was detoxed with Methadone. Methadone is impossible to quit. Methodone was developed by Hitler to replace the low reserves of Morphine. I would swear that during my times of methodone detox that the devil himself made methodone because the withdraw1s were so horrible. The last time I detoxed from methadone, I robbed seven banks and shot three people, including myself! The alternative is "Buprenorphine (Suboxone)". Suboxone is still a highly addictive derivative of opuim though. The side effects include weight loss, nervousness, and a little grumpy at times so society should still have monitoring and counseling of users. However, once a heroin user is stable on suboxone, he will no longer murder. Suboxone users do not kill, they are passive, and can adapt to societies norms. Just do not take us off of it. Do not think that there is a detox method using suboxone. If this is what you think, you are naive and better hope you do not become a victim from one of us junkies; you will change your mind. Perhaps the statistics show hope, but they are false hopes. Anyway you cannot take the chance that maybe one of us will become opium free someday, because one small relapse trigger, and you better lock up your homes. We have these triggers imbeded in our brains; I call them demons. Just one trigger of the uncontrollable urge of opium, and we are addicted again. Also, I have used soboxone for years and can tell you that the withdrawals are worse than heroin. I gator-rolled (tossing and turning all night with no sleep) for weeks once when I decided it was time to quit. The withdrawals were intense with severe nervous reaction. I ended up using heroin for two weeks to detox off the suboxone. But suboxone does not kill, and the user will not kill; so give us suboxone, and let us all eventually die off. Just don't take us off of it! Once we are on suboxone, you will not have to lock us all up anymore; crime is the last thing on our mind, all we care about is the next suboxone dose. We even can hold a job and pay for it. So now with the help of suboxone, and as we are all dying from old age, you can implement the next step; save the children! Everybody wants to help children. It is the one item that would be a bipartisan Congressional movement. Instead of our politicians bickering over ideas that never materialize, they can pass a Bill that would help the children refrain from drug use as they mature. This did occur at one time during the Reagan generation, but failed. However, I Believe Nancy Reagan was truly envolved at heart; She really did want to help. So since Nancy Reagan -- using large sums of tax payer funds -- used her heart and soul to try and help children refrain from the horrors of drug addiction, where did we go wrong? It is kinda like the scenario that the brave soldiers of the Pacific island hopping campaign experienced during World War Two; only they could know how bad it was. They were unable to explain the horrors in words alone. For example, the smells of death, and how the bloated bodies moved from the maggot infestations. How can you explain these few examples out of hundreds of other horrors to a public who never experienced it? How can the public know what it actually was like? They can't unless they experience for themselves. So for the public and the politicians to tell the children; "just say no," was naive. I am sure there were other benificial entities put into place, but they did not work. But this generation of students can make it work. I will explain how. In my opinion, the only ones who can save the children from becoming what I have become, are the current college students of today. You have survived a drug free life so far or you would not have achieved the academic challenges you have already faced. You are what America will be in twenty years. In those twenty years our children will either be dead, or worse; like me. However, if you use first hand experiences from us drug addicts, along with your academic skills and organization, we may be able to convince Congress to pass a Bill with the funds to implement a pilot program for the saving of our children. What would the pilot program consist of? A chosen city with the funds to build a drug pre-rehabilitation childrens program (DPCP). Or call it what you will, but the point is to place children at the age pr*-or to their most vulnerable period in their life into a Federally funded DPCP.What is this age? Between elementary school, and junior high. This is when you can save them. I would suggest all children be enrolled in a DPCP during the summer months prior to junior high school, or it will be too late. What is a DPCP? Actually, would it not be cool to call it after Madison Cross who died maybe not in vane? You could call it the Madison Act. The Madison Act would allocate the funds to build Madison Centers. A Madison Center is a facility that has a self contained infrastructure with class rooms, vocational training rooms, and activities such as pools, rock climbing, filming centers, and an ethical reprogramming control enviromental room. What does a Madison Center do? It enrolls all children during the summer months right before Junior Highschool. It teaches them all about drugs and that you are to never take an opioid while visiting a hospital or dentist. Only take said medication if you are burn, cancer, or other very serious patient. This is why millions are homeless accross the country living on the streets while defecating in front of businesses. Because sometime in their life, a doctor gave them a pill for a toothache. That pill was an opioid. I received opioids for a back ache once. Perhaps if I would of been enrolled in a Madison Center, I would have learned that you always tell the doctor to give you non-narcotic medication, and I would not be here in prison serving a 40 year prison sentence! Because for most people, once you take that first pill and learn how good the high is, you are hooked for life, specially if you are young and dumb like I was. Madison Centers are equipped with proffesional staff who went to college to learn their trade. Just imagine all the new jobs this would incourage. Staff will teach the kid everything there is to know on how to not use drugs. First of all the only ones that can help the children from becoming what I have Congressional funded Madison centers will teach ethics, and the fundamental morals that are associated with living a drug free active life. They do not teach these things in school. Basically you must brain-wash children through-out the country to deplore, and to look at the drug life as a loser enviroment. They must be taught to look at drug use as un-cool, not like when I was a kid in which it was cool to use drugs. We bucked society and lived a drug enduced party life. Madison centers can not only have classroom lectures, but should also focus on keeping kids busy while setting them up; on a path to stay, busy in the future. Idle kids use drugs. When kids just hang out because there is nothing for them to do, they will resort to drugs. Some kids to not do well with school sports, so Madison centers will find something else to keep them busy. It is a shame that there is not more for them to do but play with their computers. Specially when they play games that cause killing sprees. If they play games in which they shoot hundreds of people to death, they have a tendency to want to do it realistically. I know, I shot three people and picked up the habit by watching movies with violence, and video games. Madison centers will show them that there is more to life than killing people with machine guns on video games. For example; aeronautics. Boys and girls both love aircraft. Teach them to fly gliders and drones Show them ground school principles, take them to airshows; lead them to a path of long term activities that they will thrive on for the rest of their lives, instead of hanging out doing drugs, and/or playing video's; killing people! In conclusion, I have just layed out a plan with a few examples. you will need to get the funds from congress by proposing a plan. Hopefully your teachers and professors will give vou extra credit for this. You will need to sit down and think of all the great things that a Madison Center could do to help children be drug free for the future of the country. Perhaps you could get sponsers such as Kim Kardashian who helped us get Congressional approval for a prison reform Bill called the First Step Act. She is such a great women! Forget about us current drug addicts. Just give us SubOxone and let us die off. Focus on the children! I know it can be done if you all just start. I forget who said this but if you take the first step, the rest will follow. Sit down with a group, and start writing a plan. It will work and save Billions by not having to use mass incarceration and public resources anymore. Or another method that would be the alternative and most definitely would be efficient: Send out flyers stating that for one week only all opioid users will get a free sample of heroin at the local police sub-station. Every single user all across the country will show up to get that shot of heroin. When we arrive at the front desk to get our shot, put a bullet into our heads! Matter of fact since millions of children will grow up just like us junkies, kill them too! -- "Or submit a Madison Act today." Written by. Robert G. Lockwood 89907-012 Federal Bureau of Prisons
