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I recently interviewed some of my habitual customers in the jail. These are the guys who are addicted to heroin, but will take any drug they can get to obtain their high. I spoke to them individually with one inmate speaking very freely. The other two still had some difficulty getting over the fact that even though I am retired, they were still spilling their guts to a police officer with over 40 years on the job.

The main reason the inmates wanted to talk to me was that spending six months or more confined in a room with other drug addicts and violent criminals gave them the opportunity to vent about their habits and the problems they have caused in their lives. Some want to get into a drug treatment program, some just want to do their time and get back out on the street where they can continue to get high on mostly heroin as that is the life they have become accustomed to.

All inmates I spoke with agreed with the price of their drugs. The drugs are purchased in Dayton with each one of them having mostly a dealer or two whom they frequent. There is no friendship between the dealers and the addicts. A dealer may sell a legitimate cap of heroin or it may be all phentenyl which will kill most people.

A cap is a large opaque capsule that will hold a single hit of heroin. The addicts keep the cap after it is empty so it can be refilled in hopes of getting a free cap from the dealer. Kind of like when I would cash in pop bottles as a kid to purchase candy at Bill’s Market in Northridge.

So what are the addicts paying for a cap of heroin? $5 per cap is the going rate. At about $20 the dealer will give a discount and give them six caps. For $40 the addict may get 13 or 14 caps and $80 will buy 30 caps. Most dealers are selling pure phentenyl because it is cheaper and easier to get in Dayton right now. This is what the addicts say is killing everybody because it is much more deadly than heroin.

One addict does 4 caps of heroin at a time, usually three times a day. He was working as a District Manager for a chain restaurant and spending his whole check, $606 per week just buying heroin. And the addicts do not call it heroin, they pronounce it “Hairon.”

Asked how he got addicted, the man told me he was 18 years old and selling heroin and marijuana because it was easy money. One day his best friend who was an addict convinced him to try what he is selling. This guy had been his best friend since before first grade. The friend set up a syringe and stuck it in a vein. Feeling the euphoria, my words not his exactly, he wanted it more and more.

Finally all he wanted was to get high. At 23 years of age this addict has three numbers already. That means three times in prison, not counting county jail time. He has two children by woman he was not married to and calls her his ex. He also calls her his “Baby momma.”

Baby momma will not let this addict see his children or talk to them on the phone. We have phones in the jail for the inmates use if they call collect or purchase phone cards if someone puts money on their books. This addict sits around depressed because he has ruined his life. Can’t see his children or ex, worries about his mother out there alone without him to take care of her. When on the street and spending all his time thinking about getting high, the addict does not eat for a week or more, instead wanting to spend money on drugs. The first month incarcerated in the county jail this stint, the inmate has been eating now for 23 days and gained 43 pounds back. And we feed them what the State of Ohio Department of Corrections requires.

Another inmate admitted he does six to seven caps per day but sees that he is increasing the doses more and more. All these inmates go through the same ordeals as the drugs they become addicted to requiring more and more dosage amounts to overcome the body’s tolerance.

Some inmates prefer the straight phentenyl because one gram will last for two whole days. The price for the phentenyl is $80 per gram. I did ask about marijuana, which they only use if it is free at a party because it costs them $40 for 1/8th of an ounce. A whole ounce of weed will cost them $250 and last only a week.

Another inmate is losing his eyesight and teeth because he prefers methamphetamine. This inmate mostly lies in his bunk and talks to other inmates who will come talk to him. They mostly talk about what the drugs has cost them in their lives. The meth addict pays about $30 to $40 per gram. Meth can be snorted, smoked or they shoot it just like heroin. The meth addict will purchase two to three grams of meth for around $100 and do all of it until it is gone. That much will last the addict about five to six days. Then he has to go find money to purchase more. I did not even go into how they find the money because they will kill their relatives, steal from stores, scam older people, anything to get the drug money.

One effect the meth has that is not present with other drugs is seeing “Shadow people.” One addict tells of using duct tape to affix his child to the wall to keep it quiet and out of trouble while the addict is using. The addict swears it is true, but finds it hard to believe that he would do such a thing.

An encounter with shadow people affected another to stop using meth. He had been using meth with a friend and a female. While high, the addict went outside because the Dayton Police came to the house. Soon more police started arriving so the addict climbed into an old abandoned car in the yard. From the front seat he crawled into the trunk and could see all that was going on in and around the house.

A pair of Dayton Police Officers were checking the grounds and came up to the car he was hiding in and shined their flashlights but left when they did not see him in the trunk. For five hours the addict hid in the trunk and saw as detectives arrived, the Montgomery County Coroner arrived, placed the female’s body in a body bag and took her away in a van that had “Montgomery County Coroner” painted on the side.

After all the police and officials left, the addict got out of his hiding spot and went back into the house where his friend was sitting alone. Telling him he saw all the police and coroner from the trunk of the car and how sorry he was that their friend overdosed and died. The other addict laughed at him and said she left soon after he left and there was no police or anyone else here all night.

The addict felt it was so real, seeing all the shadow people that he no longer does Meth. He also tells of the time he ran over two people standing in the street while driving while high on meth but they also turned out to be shadow people. He thinks.

One addict tells of the time he overdosed on his son’s birthday. The Troy Fire Department had to spray Narcan up his nose twice and the hospital shot him full of it in the veins. When he awoke in the hospital he was so sick, he puked for a solid five minutes.

An addict will withdraw from the heroin when in jail in about three to five days although I have seen some take longer, some less time. The drugs affect their sleeping habit and they find it hard to sleep. They ask for extra blankets because they freeze, constantly get up to go because they have severe diarrhea and if they do lie down, they suffer restless feet syndrome which keeps them awake.

Another problem they all share in common is Hepatitis C. Rather than spend money on new kits, with clean syringes, they will share with other addicts or use their own dirty syringes until they break. Most all the addicts have Hep C, Herpes and some have AIDS.

Most all have lost their driving privileges but continue to drive, because they have to go get the drugs. And in Ohio if your driver’s license is suspended you can’t purchase insurance, so none of them are covered.

I am sure there are other stories in the jail. More than I want to write about. But it seems that the life of an addict is not the life I want to live.