Another Drug Arrest, Is There Hope for Change?

Across my desk came another police release of a drug arrest. It makes no difference where the arrest went down; the alleged crime was peddling heroin here in Cape May County. That is close to home regardless whether one resides in a posh neighborhood with emerald-green, sprinkler-watered lawns or a weed surrounded rental unit.
Some might say it is a “victimless” crime, drug addiction, but I think differently. In rippling waves, drug use affects each of us, some to a greater degree than others, but there is an effect on us as a society.
The pervasiveness of illegal drugs in each municipality of this county proves a fact more troubling than the dope itself, that is, that there is a perceived need for that brief mechanism of escape from reality.
A bit more about that police release, the young man arrested, what of his family, his father and mother, or aunts and uncles? How do they feel about it?
Most important in my book, is there hope for redemption of that young man? Can he become someone upstanding in the community who a new generation will revere for the change he made in his life? Who will give this young man an opportunity for a new, clean start, should he be returned to prison and then released?
A short search into the state Department of Corrections files indicated that the man was no stranger to the “system.” He had previously been incarcerated, all for the same crimes, selling illegal drugs.
What does this reveal about our “corrections” and judicial systems? Perhaps “corrections” is no longer the word to use, since many, as this young man, have prior offenses, some dating back years. They certainly were not “corrected” from their former transgressions. While there are counseling sessions in prison, are they of any value, or must a revelation come from within to make a change in one’s life?
The courts are so overburdened with cases, especially related to drugs or alcohol, that it has become something of a very expensive game played by prosecution and defense. “We’ll cut a deal, if you agree to this…” Is that justice or correction? You decide.
Drugs are here, they are real, and they are killing our young people, although many refuse to believe the truth. Quick drug deals happen seemingly in the blink of an eye, perhaps by someone on a bicycle pedaling slowly in certain neighborhoods. A car stops, the cyclist goes up to the driver, they “shake hands” and both drive off, both tucking something in their pocket or waistband.
That recent arrest convinced me:
A. The drug plague is here.
B. It is not getting better.
C. Like poison ivy vines that spread upward in a tree, drugs foul everything and everyone associated with them.
D. There is a market for illicit drugs.
If society decided to rid itself of the scourge of illegal drugs, to wipe out the urge to use them, there would be no need for young men, seeking a fast buck, to make criminals of themselves selling a substance that can be fatal to its user.
Scholars among us opine that one way to eradicate this drug plaque is to make them legal. Let government control drug sales, and, sha-zaam, away goes the problem. They point to rumrunners who hustled booze in Prohibition, which were the bane of law enforcement of their time. Once legalized, the problem was “solved.” Not really, it was just no longer illegal to sell or drink booze if you were of legal age, in a place that could legally sell it, and were not drinking in your vehicle.
Problems still abound with alcohol, so the problem did not vanish it only became legal. Retailers still must fear selling to underage patrons, many of whom pay $200 or more for fake identification cards prod
Families are still broken by alcoholism, just as families suffer from illegal drug use and sale.
The alleged purveyor of over six dozen bags of heroin, “prepackaged for street sales,” according to the police release, could have turned the dope into about $1,000 on the street. Imagine that!
In a county where jobs are tougher than nails to find, and unemployment checks fuel the local economy, one has to wonder just where that $1,000 would have originated. It likely would come from allowances or maybe stolen from another’s wallet or pocketbook, who knows. Possibly it would have been the rent money or money for school clothes or, how chilling, food for the children.
Drug pushers do not care where the money comes from; all they care about it is quick cash, swapped in lightning fast pass-by transactions on sidewalks and street corners.
Does the drug problem point to a lack of especially male mentoring? If a young, man had a strong role model, someone to shake him and wake him, and tell him there is a world of opportunity if he wants to find a decent job and work.
For those who pooh pooh such a notion, look around your town, say at a donut shop. Very few owners of such legitimate businesses suffer from lack of customers or money. There is great profit in a donut, yet how many young people think along such lines to open a humble donut shop?
Some may easily cite a “bad home life” for the reason some decide pushing drugs is better than working for a living. I counter some very famous people have had hellish home lives, yet they found the right path on which to travel, and it was not to peddle drugs.
I want input from readers about the drug problem in Cape May County. What can we do, as a community, to confront this growing cancer and save our young people, and, largely ourselves? Talk to me. Let us put out ideas for our legislators to embrace so the future may be brighter for each and every one.
Such a change cannot be done by dozens or hundreds, but by one life at a time.