In the state of New York, more than 2,000 people died of heroin overdoses in 2014. The highly-addictive drug is surging in nearly every county in the United States. Its negative effects are becoming harder to hide. Last week, a fender-bender in Watertown brought the reality of heroin abuse in the North Country into every day life.
Sixty-two year-old Randy Petrie was waiting at a red light in Watertown when he was rear-ended by a pickup truck. Lt. Joe Donoghue with the Watertown City Police heard the call at 2:30 p.m.
“So Mr. Petrie and a passenger in his vehicle come out to look at the damage the truck had hit and rolled back, it went forward again striking the Petrie vehicle," Donoghue said.
The truck stayed pressed up against Petrie’s car. Donoghue says the driver, 23-year-old Eric Alden, was passed out at the wheel. “The gentleman was slumped over. His foot must have been on the gas because the tires kept spinning.”
Unable to open the driver side door, a witness broke the truck’s window and reached over the driver to turn the engine off. Later, Donoghue said the witness told police what he'd seen inside. “There was a needle in the gentlemen’s lap.”
Later at the hospital, Alden admitted to using heroin before driving. Donoghue says heroin is cheap and easy to get. Users are buying it on the streets and in parking lots, then use it immediately. Donoghue isn’t surprised by any of this anymore, but he says the user's decision to drive next is shocking.
“Why you would do it before you drive a vehicle. it’s not crazy, it’s criminal.”
Across the country, the heroin epidemic is seeping into everyday life. Lawmakers are scrambling to catch up with addiction numbers. Last week, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) asks the Senate to support her bill to restrict opiate prescriptions to stop addictions before they happen. On the same day, Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced anyone who stops at a pharmacy will be able to pick up Narcan, a drug that stops the effects of an overdose.
"Ten years ago we would have never would have thought it would have been an issue up here," said Bill Bowman leader of PIVOT, a drug-abuse non-profit in Jefferson County.
“With Fort Drum and with a transient population you might expect some of it but to be in this degree and for it to be so systemic across the country, it’s just unbelievable."
Bowman says since 2011, eighty people in Jefferson County have died from a heroin overdose. In only three years, St. Lawrence County Drug Task Force has seen heroin cases quadruple. Bowman says the heroin epidemic in the region is getting worse. And there’s a lack of treatment for users in the North Country. The only medically supervised detox center is in Potsdam.
“There’s not enough resources to be able to put a dent into this,” said Bowman.
He's waiting any day now to hear if Watertown will get state money for a local recovery center. The competition is intense. The state will only fund six centers, each in a different region of the state. Bowman is crossing his fingers the North Country will win out.
