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  • Massachusetts Mental Health Court Serves As Alternative To Jail Time

    Massachusetts Mental Health Court Serves As Alternative To Jail Time

    The Recovery with Justice program was established by a local judge who believes jail is not always the answer.

    Nearly one-fifth of prisoners have been diagnosed with a mental health disorder. This fact has pushed one Massachusetts judge to take action. 

    Kathleen Coffey, a judge in the West Roxbury neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts, is hoping to change the way these individuals receive treatment through a program called Recovery with Justice.  

    Coffey, who serves as the Specialty Courts Director for the Boston Municipal Court, created the program hoping to help those with mental health and other developmental disorders with an alternative to jail time. 

    “Many people end up in the criminal justice system because other systems have failed them and the social safety net has failed them,” Coffey told Boston 25 News. “Often times, mental illness has not been flagged, or has not been identified as a contributing factor.” 

    According to the mental health court’s official webpage, the program “is a specialized court session that helps defendants maintain stability, achieve recovery and avoid incarceration by providing intensive social services and mental health treatment.”

    Those in the program must take part in community-based treatment for at least three months and will be reviewed by a court team. In each case, a probation officer works alongside a mental health clinician to identify the needs of each individual. Based on those needs, a specific plan is created. This plan may include treatment referrals and opportunities for housing, education and employment. 

    The recipient of one such plan, Mario Torres, tells Boston 25 News that he has been in and out of jail for a total of 20 to 25 years throughout his life. He says that going to mental health court is a way of talking through his struggles, almost like therapy. 

    “Judge Coffey is pretty understanding about my addiction,” Torres said. “I had a drug problem in my past… constantly into trouble and getting arrested.” 

    “I look back and I have thrown my life out the window,” he added.

    Torres hopes that being a part of Recovery with Justice will help him get his life on track for good.

    “I want to be a productive member to society,” Torres said.

    Throughout Massachusetts, Boston 25 News reports, there are currently seven mental health courts. At the one in West Roxbury, more than 200 people have been admitted.

    “We are keeping good people out of jail and within the community, recognizing that is what the court system is supposed to do,” Coffey said. “We are supposed to be here to help people.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Sackler Family Says Opioid Lawsuit Is "Misleading"

    Sackler Family Says Opioid Lawsuit Is "Misleading"

    The family’s lawyers have filed motions to dismiss the complaint filed against them by the Massachusetts Attorney General.

    Members of the billionaire Sackler family say that public outrage over their alleged role in the opioid epidemic—as the owners of OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma—is all a big misunderstanding. 

    According to lawsuits filed across the country, including one in Massachusetts, members of the Sackler family played an active role in pushing opioid painkillers marketed by Purdue Pharma, despite knowing about the addiction risks.

    As the national opioid crisis worsened, the company even considered selling addiction medication to further profit off of opioid addiction, the lawsuits allege. 

    However, a statement made by the family’s attorneys this week said that prosecutors and the press are cherry-picking information to make the family look bad, according to WGBH Boston. 

    “We are confident the court will look past the inflammatory media coverage generated by the misleading complaint and apply the law fairly by dismissing all of these claims,” the statement read. 

    The Sacklers are one of the richest families in the U.S. and are major donors to museums, colleges and other institutions. However, the family has been subject to more scrutiny as the lawsuits against them pile up.

    In February, activists staged a “die-in” at the Guggenheim Museum in New York City to highlight the role of the Sacklers in promoting addictive opioids. The family had donated extensively to the museum. More recently, a donation to the UK’s National Portrait Gallery was mutually cancelled because of public outcry. 

    “It has become evident that recent reporting of allegations made against Sackler family members may cause this new donation to deflect the National Portrait Gallery from its important work,” a spokesperson for the Sackler Trust told NPR. “The allegations against family members are vigorously denied.”

    Those allegations include that family members, particularly former Purdue Pharma President and Chairman Richard Sackler, were actively involved with marketing OxyContin in misleading ways even when they knew the risk of addiction to the pills was high. The Massachusetts lawsuit alleges that Sackler even visited doctors to help push OxyContin, something that the family denies. 

    Richard Sackler also reportedly made a comment in 1996 about OxyContin’s launch being “followed by a blizzard of prescriptions that will bury the competition.”

    This week, attorneys for the family said that the statement was taken out of context, and that Sackler was actually referring to a snow blizzard that had made him late for the event. 

    The statement goes on to say that the lawsuit “mischaracterizes and selectively quotes from the hundreds of documents it cites to create the false impression” that the family “micromanaged every aspect of Purdue’s marketing strategy.” Rather, the family was not that closely involved with the operations of Purdue, the statement said. 

    However, the Sackler family (not just Purdue) was ordered to pay $75 million over five years as part of a settlement with the state of Oklahoma last week. After that, New York added the family to its ongoing lawsuit against Purdue. 

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Sweden Rethinks Zero Tolerance Drug Policy as Cocaine Use Rises

    Sweden Rethinks Zero Tolerance Drug Policy as Cocaine Use Rises

    Swedish authorities are trying to learn what factors are contributing to the rising rates of use (and overdose), including the way they police.

    Officials in Sweden are rethinking their policies as cocaine use, and overdoses, continue to rise despite their hard-line stance on drugs.

    According to SVT, Sweden’s national public news broadcasting service, the drug has only grown stronger, more common, and cheaper in the last few years.

    Police and customs have seized 300% more cocaine since 2012. Swedish customs reports seizing as much as 485 kg of the stuff. Cocaine was also found to be the cause of death in 20 cases last year, a massive increase from a few years ago with just one reported case.

    While such numbers may seem small in relation to other countries, such a significant spike has caused concern in Sweden and a scramble to find out why.

    “Cocaine has increased at least four-fold. This indicates that usage has increased,” said Robert Kronstrand, of the Swedish National Board of Forensic Medicine. “Blood samples have improved, which may explain more positive tests, but that’s not the reason for the sharp increase.”

    Even the police agree that better testing doesn’t account for the sharp rise in cocaine cases. They’ve seen a significant shift in who is dying, and where: past cocaine deaths were associated with social gatherings, but almost all 2018 deaths were at home.

    Sweden’s drug policy is being called into question as it is among one of the most hard-line policies in Europe. Police have the authority to urine test anyone they suspect of using drugs, and pretty much no distinction is made between hard and soft drugs. The policy’s aim was to squash all use of drugs.

    “Prohibiting both personal use and the possession and sale of drugs in Sweden makes it harder for ‘open drug scenes’ to arise, i.e. places where drugs are used and sold more or less openly. This is an important element in systematically reducing access to drugs and preventing people from using drugs,” the policy reads.

    In a grim sense, the policy succeeded, leading people to use and die in their own homes. It’s a policy that has come under criticism by the United Nations.

    Sweden’s laws stand in stark contrast to its neighbor Norway, which is moving towards the decriminalization of all drugs. The intention is to “stop punishing people who struggle, but instead give them help and treatment,” said Nicolas Wilkinson of Norway’s Socialist Labour Party. The end goal is to divert the handling of drug cases away from the justice system to the health care system.

    In Sweden, multiple parties in parliament have banded together to take on the problem. This isn’t the first time Sweden has swiftly responded to substance abuse issues, having restricted the sale of hand sanitizer in 2016 after a rash of teenagers showed up in emergency rooms from drinking the alcogels.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • FDA To Investigate Whether Vaping Causes Seizures

    FDA To Investigate Whether Vaping Causes Seizures

    The FDA will investigate cases of seizures possibly related to vaping—but no links have been made yet.

    The Food and Drug Administration announced Wednesday that it will be looking into 35 individual cases of people having seizures after vaping between 2010 and 2019.

    Most of these cases have happened to young adults or underage kids, and the FDA is concerned about the implications, according to CNBC.

    “While 35 cases may not seem like much compared to the total number of people using e-cigarettes, we are nonetheless concerned by these reported cases,” said FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb and Principal Deputy Commissioner Amy Abernethy.

    Vaping with e-cigarettes has grown in popularity, sparking concern among health experts who stress that even without the additives found in normal cigarettes, nicotine can still have negative health effects that get worse the younger the user is.

    It’s currently unclear whether the seizures in these 35 cases were caused by vaping, but these alarming and potentially dangerous neurological events can be caused by nicotine poisoning.

    “We’re sharing this early information with the public because as a public health agency, it’s our job to communicate about potential safety concerns associated with the products we regulate that are under scientific investigation by the agency,” Gottlieb and Abernethy said in their joint statement.

    Last December, U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams officially declared e-cigarette use among young people to be a national epidemic. E-cigarettes are often marketed as being safe alternatives to regular cigarettes and surveys have found that young people believe the hype.

    Vaping is no less addictive than combustible smoking, and according to an article in Yale Medicine, studies are finding that “vaping increases the risk a teen will smoke regular cigarettes later.”

    Health experts are also concerned about the high concentration of nicotine in each e-cigarette “pod”—the replaceable cartridges that contain the liquid form of the drug—compared to a combustible cigarette. Some of these pods contain higher concentrations than others, and some, called “pod mods,” are made from nicotine salts that have an even higher concentration of nicotine than the traditional e-cigarette pod.

    According to the Surgeon General Advisory on e-cigarettes, they can also contain heavy metals, chemical flavorants linked to lung disease, and “volatile organic compounds.” The FDA has had difficulty keeping up with the rapid development of the vaping industry, meaning that users may be unknowingly inhaling unsafe materials.

    The National Institute on Drug Abuse also found that a full two-thirds of teens who vape believe that their e-cigarettes only contain flavoring. Only 13.2% knew that they were inhaling nicotine.

    Still, the FDA acknowledges that there are many other factors that could have led to the seizures, including other drugs taken and prior histories of seizures. 

    “We want to be clear that we don’t yet know if there’s a direct relationship between the use of e-cigarettes and a risk of seizure,” they said.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Prince Harry: Fortnite Is Addictive & Irresponsible

    Prince Harry: Fortnite Is Addictive & Irresponsible

    The royal soon-to-be parent feels the video game has an alarmingly strong grip on kids these days… and perhaps should be banned.

    Prince Harry spoke out against Fortnite, one of the most popular video games among kids today, during a talk with mental health experts in London. He even floated the idea that the game itself should be banned.

    “That game shouldn’t be allowed. Where is the benefit of having it in your household?” he pondered. “It’s created to addict, an addiction to keep you in front of a computer for as long as possible. It’s so irresponsible.”

    He added that not taking immediate action would be a mistake.

    “It’s like waiting for the damage to be done and kids turning up on your doorsteps and families being broken down,” Prince Harry said.

    He feels sympathy for the parents dealing with something they might not understand.

    “Parents have got their hands up – they don’t know what to do about it,” he remarked. “It’s like waiting for the damage to be done.”

    Fortnite, developed by North Carolina-based company Epic Games, boasts 45 million players worldwide. Players battle each other on a large map, battle-royale style.

    The game itself is free but players can purchase costumes and dances for their characters, reportedly earning Epic more than $300 million a month.

    Prince Harry’s concern doesn’t grow from nothing. Some doctors are reportedly seeing a link between excessive gaming and the health of their young patients. Additionally, about 200 divorce cases in the UK from January to September of 2018 mentioned excessive gaming, including Fortnite, as a cause.

    Fans and some experts are not convinced. Andrew Reid, a Scottish university researcher, says that calling games like Fortnite “addictive” needlessly stigmatizes all players and that there are positive social aspects to going online. E-sports director Sujoy Roy says believes panicked parents should take responsibility instead of pointing fingers.

    “Fortnite isn’t the first hit game to have had a bad press and it won’t be the last. It’s really popular with younger gamers and, of course, parents should keep a close eye on what their kids are playing and doing online,” said Roy. “But, like many games, Fortnite is a really fun and sociable way to spend free time and, like everything, should be enjoyed responsibly.”

    Prince Harry’s criticisms didn’t stop at video gaming. He also blasted social media for being “more addictive than drugs and alcohol.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • "Hope Stems" Campaign Spotlights How Opioids Affect The Brain Using Flowers

    "Hope Stems" Campaign Spotlights How Opioids Affect The Brain Using Flowers

    The floral exhibit coincided with the Macy’s Flower Show, and aimed to depict opioid addiction in a different light.

    While flowers are typically given on joyous occasions—births, graduations or anniversaries—florists around the nation have also found themselves preparing hundreds of thousands of bouquets for the funerals of people who have died from opioid addiction. 

    With that in mind, the addiction advocacy group Shatterproof has launched a new initiative, showing a brain made from more than 9,000 carnations, pockmarked by black poppies meant to represent the effects of opioids on the brain. 

    The exhibit, called “Hope Stems” was on display in Herald Square in New York City from Tuesday to Thursday (April 2-4). 

    The public was invited to remove a poppy from the bouquet, symbolizing the restoration that happens when someone gets treatment and is able to overcome their opioid addiction. 

    “As a father who lost his son to addiction, ‘Hope Stems’ gives me so much optimism,” Shatterproof Founder Gary Mendell, whose son died by suicide in 2011 after fighting opioid addiction, told Campaign Live. “This installation will impact how people view those suffering from addiction. It is my sincere wish that this campaign will help end the stigma and encourage those who are suffering to seek treatment. By changing how we think about addiction we can save lives.”

    The display is timed to coincide with the Macy’s Flower Show, which runs through Sunday, April 7. 

    June Laffey, who works as chief creative officer at McCann Health New York, said that the “Hope Stems” campaign is a powerful way to raise awareness and get attendees at the flower show to think about addiction and ways to provide treatment to people who need it. 

    “This campaign has the power to not only change the way people think about opioid addiction, but to save lives,” Laffey said. 

    By using the flowers to form a brain, the initiative focused on the fact that addiction is a brain disease, not simply a matter of willpower or choice. 

    “Opioid addiction is not a weakness,” Laffey said. “It is a disease that changes the brain. There’s science to prove it. With knowledge comes power. With knowledge comes compassion. With knowledge comes hope.”

    She continued, “Hope stems from reducing the stigma and speaking with compassion. So let’s all speak with one voice. The more we reduce stigma, the more people will seek treatment and the more lives will be saved.”

    After New York, the Hope Stems display will appear in Atlanta from April 22-25 (Monday through Thursday) during the Rx Drug Abuse & Heroin Summit.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Are Millennials Redefining Sobriety?

    Are Millennials Redefining Sobriety?

    Millennials may be choosing to lean into moderation more than other generations. 

    American consumers have traditionally been divided into two camps: those who drink, and those who abstain completely—often because they are in recovery. However, young Americans seem to be pushing back on that dichotomy by taking a more moderate and measured approach to drinking. 

    Sam Thonis, who operates a sober bar, told The Atlantic that he has seen a change in attitude among patrons.  

    “It feels to me like the older people are, the more they see [our bar] as a thing for sober people. They see it as black or white—you drink or you don’t drink,” Thonis said. “With younger people, there’s a lot more receptiveness to just not drinking sometimes.”

    Despite more talk about less drinking, it’s hard to measure the trend. 

    “There isn’t any great statistical evidence yet that young adults have altered their drinking habits on a grand scale,” Amanda Mull writes for The Atlantic. “Changes in habit often lag behind changes in attitude, and national survey data on drinking habits reflect only small declines in heavy alcohol use.” 

    Cassie Schoon, of Denver, said that she started to reexamine her drinking habits after a particularly bad hangover following election night 2016. 

    “I was in this meeting feeling absolutely miserable, and I was like, You know, this is not what grown-ups do,” she said. 

    Today, she still drinks, but much less than she used to. Rather than always meeting friends at a bar, she is just as likely to meet at a museum or for coffee, the 37-year-old said. 

    “[Drinking] has to be more of an occasion for me now, like someone’s birthday or a girls’ night. So it’s once every couple of weeks instead of a weekly occurrence.”

    Leanne Vanderbyl, of San Francisco, had a similar realization as she aged. “It wasn’t until I hit my 30s that I realized that alcohol was no longer my friend.”

    For others, the decision to drink less is about weighing priorities. 

    “I’ve already calculated how much I’m saving by not drinking, and I’m thinking about where I can put that money now,” said Alex Belfiori, 30. 

    Therapist Britta Stark, who works with people with addiction, said that many millennials have healthy self-care practices in place, so they’re not left reaching for the bottle after a stressful day. 

    “There does come a time when there has to be some introspection. Folks in the millennial generation have maybe a better sense of balance,” she said. “Some do yoga or meditation or are physically active, so they don’t need to find stimulation and stress reduction in substances.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Celebs Petition Trump To Commute Sentence For Rapper Loon

    Celebs Petition Trump To Commute Sentence For Rapper Loon

    Grammy-winning singer Faith Evans, rapper Baby Bash and NBA All-Star Kevin Garnett are among the signees of the petition. 

    A contingent of entertainment industry figures is rallying around an effort to have President Donald Trump free a former hip-hop artist serving a 14-year prison sentence for heroin trafficking.

    Former Bad Boy recording artist, Loon, is the subject of a letter to Trump and petition filed by former music producer turned criminal justice advocate Weldon Angelos who served 13 of a 55-year sentence for firearm possession and charges related to marijuana trafficking, and who hopes that a presidential commutation of sentence could act as a “bridge building” effort between the White House and the entertainment industry.

    Among the letter’s signees are Grammy-winning singer Faith Evans, rapper Baby Bash, and Alice Johnson, whom Trump released from prison in 2018.

    Loon, who was born Chauncey Hawkins, earned a Top 10 album with his eponymous debut release for Bad Boy in 2003, and collaborated with label chief Sean “P. Diddy” Combs, Usher and Toni Braxton before parting ways with the music industry in 2008 and converting to Islam.

    As Amir Junaid Muhadith, he worked as a motivational speaker but was arrested in 2011 for his involvement with individuals operating a drug-trafficking ring in North Carolina. Having been convicted of two prior felonies, Loon declined to go to trial and accepted the 14-year sentence to avoid, in his words, “mandatory life in prison [with] no hopes of parole.”

    In the petition, Angelos cited Trump’s own statements about prison reform, including comments issued after the commutation of Alice Johnson’s sentence, in which the president said, “Those who have paid their debt to society and worked hard to better themselves while in prison deserve a second chance.”

    Johnson had served 21 years of a life sentence for conspiracy to possess cocaine and attempted possession of cocaine before Kim Kardashian West pled her case to the White House.

    Angelos also sees the commutation as an opportunity for Trump to forge a connection to the entertainment industry, which has, in many cases, kept him at arms’ length. “His case is like a bridge builder,” said Angelos. “Now we can bring entertainers to the White House who would disagree with Trump otherwise.”

    Angelos said that he plans to deliver the letter to the White House within the next three weeks. In addition to Evans, Baby Bash and Johnson, the public figures that have added their names to the letter include producers Stevie J., Kevin McCall and Michael Goldstein, rappers Freeway and Benzino; film producers Marc Levin and Scott Budnick; Roc-A-Fella Records co-founder Damon “Dame” Dash; former Minnesota Timberwolves/Boston Celtics great Kevin Garnett; and CAN-DO founder Amy Povah.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Netflix Doc "Legend of Cocaine Island" Proves Truth Is Stranger Than Fiction

    Netflix Doc "Legend of Cocaine Island" Proves Truth Is Stranger Than Fiction

    The documentary explores one man’s search for 70 pounds of cocaine allegedly buried off the coast of Puerto Rico.

    *This article may contain spoilers*

    A tall tale about a lost fortune in illicit drugs serves as the backbone for director Theo Love’s documentary The Legend of Cocaine Island.

    The feature-length effort—a mix of interviews and off-kilter recreations—debuted on Netflix on March 29 and details the search for 70 pounds of cocaine allegedly buried off the coast of Puerto Rico by Florida native Rodney Hyden, who saw the stash as his ticket out of financial dire straits incurred by the 2008 recession. What happened to the drugs, and to Hyden, plays as “a campfire story gone wrong,” according to Love.

    The short version of the story, which has been detailed with varying degrees of incredulity in numerous publications, is that Hyden learned about the alleged lost bales of cocaine from a local eccentric named Julian, who claimed that he had come across 70 pounds of cocaine while on the island of Culebra.

    Unsure of what to do with the fortune in drugs—roughly valued at more than $2 million—Julian allegedly buried the stash on the island and retreated to Archer, Florida, where he repeated the story to anyone who’d listen, preferably over beers around a campfire.

    Hyden, who had relocated to Archer after the collapse of his construction company, saw dollar signs in Julian’s story, and with the help of Andy, a young man with a history of drug dependency, decided to investigate Julian’s claims and hopefully set on the path to financial security.

    What actually happened—and again, here’s where the spoilers can be found—is that Hyden located the cocaine but was unable to retrieve it, and reached out to who he believed were traffickers to help him not only dig up the cocaine—approximately 13 kilo-sized packages—but sell it. The traffickers turned out to be federal agents, who arrested Hyden on charges of intent to distribute. 

    Like so many others who had heard the story of Hyden’s scheme, director Love was both astonished and captivated.

    “There was something about Rodney’s story that just seemed so absurd,” he said. And while a documentary project would encapsulate the nuts and bolts of the story, Love wanted to also focus on the reasons why Hyden pursued such an outlandish scheme.

    To that end, he asked Hyden if he would play himself in recreations of certain events. According to Love, Hyden said he’d been waiting for someone from Hollywood to contact him about a movie, and agreed to appear in the film.

    Love also corralled Andy, as well as Hyden’s daughter and the drug dealer entrusted with making connections with the Florida underworld, to appear in Legend, which has received positive reviews since its debut on Netflix.

    However, Love was unable to reel in one of the story’s key players—the mysterious Julian, whom they happened to encounter by the side of a road. When asked to retell his story for the cameras, Julian replied, in typically cryptic fashion, “It’s not my story.”

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Are Law Enforcement Efforts Making Cocaine Trafficking Worse?

    Are Law Enforcement Efforts Making Cocaine Trafficking Worse?

    Researchers examined the effects of law enforcement’s counter-drug strategies on drug trafficking. 

    New research led by the University of Alabama is showing that cocaine traffickers through Central America are continuously adapting to law enforcement efforts in ways that may be making the problem worse rather than better.

    Dr. Nicholas Magliocca, lead author of the paper showing these findings, developed a model of the “cat-and-mouse game” of cocaine smuggling vs. government efforts to seize and prevent the movement of the drug.

    “This work demonstrates that supply-side counterdrug strategies alone are, at best, ineffective and, at worst, intensifying the trafficking problem,” said Magliocca according to PHYS.org. “These networks have demonstrated their ability to adapt to interdiction efforts, identifying and exploiting new trafficking routes in response.”

    The findings, published Monday in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, show that drug traffickers routinely find ways around routes and means of transportation that are blocked by law enforcement efforts and as a result have expanded their area of use.

    In 1996, cocaine trafficking networks spread across 2 million square miles of land. By 2017, that had expanded to 7 million square miles.

    The results may suggest that new methods are needed to effectively counter drug trafficking. In 2014, the Global Commission on Drug Policy recommended decriminalizing all drugs and diverting resources from punitive measures into harm reduction strategies.

    “Policy shifts towards harm reduction, ending criminalization of people who use drugs, proportionality of sentences and alternatives to incarceration have been successfully defended over the past decades by a growing number of countries on the basis of the legal latitude allowed under the U.N. treaties,” wrote former President of Brazil and Global Commission on Drug Policy chairman Fernando Henrique Cardoso. “Further exploration of flexible interpretations of the drug treaties is an important objective, but ultimately the global drug control regime must be reformed to permit responsible legal regulation.”

    Dr. Magliocca and team’s model used the admittedly limited information on drug trafficking routes, volume, and timing to simulate and predict the decision-making process of cocaine smugglers and how their networks adapt to government anti-drug strategies. The results show that current strategies are only causing these networks to spread out, making the same law enforcement efforts more difficult and costly over time.

    “The adaptive responses of narco-traffickers within the transit zone, particularly spatial adjustments, must be understood if we are to move beyond reactive counterdrug interdiction strategies,” Magliocca concluded. His team and others will now be able to move on to exploring alternative methods to counter this growing problem.

     

    View the original article at thefix.com