October 2011 Archives

Saturday Night Live castmember Darrell Hammond reveals a disturbing crack habit, cutting himself and alcoholism in his new memoir, God If You're Not Up There, I'm F--ked.

Hammond -- who grew to fame impersonating Donald Trump, former president Bill Clinton and a raunchy Sean Connery on Jeopardy -- writes, "I kept a pint of Remy in my desk at work. The drinking calmed my nerves and quieted the disturbing images that sprang into my head ... when drinking didn't work, I cut myself."

Hammond -- who spent the longest time of any castmember on the show, 14 seasons and 270 appearances -- says he was once taken from NBC "in a straitjacket." When his wife came to visit him at New York Hospital, "I didn't recognize her," he adds.

He writes that he was addicted to cocaine in 2002, but in 2009 -- during his 14th and final season on the show -- "I had the brilliant idea I should try crack." He ended up spending time in a crack house in Harlem. He went to rehab that same year.

In 2010, he announced he was addicted to vicodin and coming down from a high while performing at comedy club Caroline's in New York City. He entered treatment again.

"I'd started adding an obscene amount of cocaine to my binges ... I had to be creative about how I did it without other people catching on or letting it interfere with the work. At least too much," he writes

Continue Reading: hollywoodreporter.com

A drug addict performed sex acts on New York Police Department officers in return for crack cocaine, a court has heard.

Melanie Perez, testifying at the trial of Jason Arbeeny, told Brooklyn Supreme Court that another officer called her to his home, made her smoke drugs and then demanded sex.

It is the latest embarrassing revelation to emerge from a police corruption trial involving eight undercover officers from the Brooklyn South Narcotics Squad.

She said: 'What was I going to do? I did it.'

Perez also said the officer, whom she only knew by the name of Frank, had later introduced her to Sean Johnston, who earlier this year was convicted on one count of corruption.

She said Johnston, who in 2010 was acquitted of 34 other charges, gave her drugs on several occasions.

Continue Reading: dailymail.co.uk

By John Richardson
BINGHAM, Maine -- Two armed robberies were enough for Chester Hibbard.

In the summer of 2010, a man wearing a hood and ski goggles entered E.W. Moore & Sons, Hibbard's community pharmacy on Main Street in Bingham. He thrust a knife across the counter at Hibbard and two employees and demanded OxyContin.

Several years earlier, a robber carrying a gun had demanded the same painkiller. Hibbard wanted the second time to be the last.

So he stopped stocking OxyContin. And he posted signs to tell everyone -- especially desperate addicts: "We don't carry OxyContin!"

Hibbard thought the signs were helping -- until last month, when a man wearing a mask entered the pharmacy with a sawed-off shotgun.

He jumped over the counter, told Hibbard, three employees and a customer to get on the floor, and tied their hands. Then he left with money and more than $12,000 worth of prescription drugs, including other narcotic painkillers.

The latest holdup in Bingham was one of the most brazen yet in Maine, U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration Agent Michael Wardrop told a group of police chiefs in southern Maine last month. He said it's clear that Maine's addiction to painkillers is fueling much of the state's crime.

"It's out of control. It's rampant. It's our number-one problem," he said.

Regular occurrences

Pharmacy robberies, unheard of 15 years ago, have become regular occurrences around the state.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration has counted 41 pharmacy robberies in Maine since Jan. 1, 2009, although the list may not be complete. Local police departments officially record the crimes as standard robberies. The DEA compiles its list from voluntary police reports and news reports.

Of the pharmacy robberies counted by the federal agency, four occurred in 2009, 21 happened in 2010, and 16 have occurred so far this year.

The robbery of Hibbard's store was one of at least seven holdups at drugstores in Maine in the month that began Aug. 29. Five occurred in Portland and South Portland, including two robberies of the CVS on Brighton Avenue in Portland. Another took place in Millinocket.

Continue Reading: policeone.com

The driver of a bus taking passengers from Chicago to Iowa City and Des Moines was arrested on drunken driving charges Friday night.

The Iowa State Patrol pulled over the Megabus around 10 p.m. Friday on Interstate 80 near Iowa City. The driver, 52-year-old Carl Smiley, of Chicago, was being held Saturday in the Johnson County jail on suspicion of operating a motor vehicle while intoxicated.

According to court documents, this would be Smiley's second DUI offense.

Continue Reading: nbcchicago.com

By: Joseph Summerill

In the words of John Adams, "facts are stubborn things, and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence."

These same words resonate today in the debate over the legalization of medical marijuana. During this month of October, which is National Substance Abuse Prevention Month, it is important that we remind ourselves about the facts of using marijuana.

First, marijuana is a Schedule I drug under the federal Controlled Substances Act, and Schedule I substances exhibit a high potential for abuse or dependency, have no accepted medical value, and are unsafe to use, even under medical supervision.

According to the Food and Drug Administration, there have been no sound scientific studies supporting the medical value of marijuana. As such, marijuana has not passed the rigid scrutiny of medicine proposed by the FDA.

Two recent comprehensive studies by the Institute of Medicine and the American Medical Association acknowledged the lack of data to support the use of smoked marijuana for medicinal purposes.

The National Institutes of Health's National Institute on Drug Abuse has even stated that marijuana is unlikely to be used as a medicine in its smoked or vaporized form because it is an unpurified plant with often unpredictable side effects and it may cause cognitive defects that dramatically hinder its utility.

What is scientifically approved by the FDA and accepted by the medical community is a medicine called Marinol, a legal, widely prescribed drug currently in pill form containing synthetic THC, a main constituent in marijuana.

This FDA-approved drug has been found to relieve the adverse side effects of patients undergoing chemotherapy and to stimulate appetites in patients suffering from HIV/AIDS

The alternative, non-FDA approved drug, smoked marijuana, contains more than 400 chemicals, many of which are identical to the most harmful chemicals and carcinogens found in cigarette smoke. The fact is that a marijuana cigarette contains four times as much tar as a tobacco cigarette.

Continue Reading: washingtonexaminer.com

The hottest ticket in the Mat-Su Valley this weekend was to a concert Saturday night promoting healthy lifestyles.

We were surprised when the You Choose Substance Abuse Prevention Project concert organizer from the AT&T Sports Center called Friday to say the show was sold out and could we help get the word out that teens attending should plan to carpool.

Organizer Gretchen Geist said that's because the venue had planned for about 500 students to attend, but instead sold 2,500 tickets.
 
An event in the Mat-Su Valley that draws 2,500 spectators is unusual. But what makes this still more unique is that this is an anti-drug rock show planned as part of Red Ribbon Week.

Woven between performances by bands Stadium and Elvis Monroe was a short documentary describing the tragic story of David Velasquez's drug- and alcohol-addicted uncle's murder-suicide and testimonials from former addicts who shared details of their stories, like how young they were when they got into drugs, what they've lost to their addictions and how they're doing now.

Up last, Elvis Monroe closes the show before all bands return to the stage to discuss their messages on positive choices.

Velasquez is the founder of this unique youth-focused effort to encourage teens to make smart decisions that move them toward their goals.

"This isn't about saying 'don't do drugs, don't drink alcohol,' this is about getting to the goal of doing what you want to do by making good choices," Elvis Monroe fill-in bassist Todd Burman told the kids at Colony high school.

Continue Reading: frontiersman.com

If you have teenagers, you may have established a system to keep them out of your liquor cabinet or wine fridge. But experts are now saying you should lock up something else -- your medicine cabinet.

The painkillers you take when your back pain flares up? It's no secret that teens are popping those for fun. The Xanax you take to calm down before a long plane ride? They're into that too. And let's not forget the Ritalin your younger child with ADHD takes, because that's another popular one among the adolescent and college set.

While prescription drug abuse isn't new, it's on the rise. One in every five teens were using them in 2009, then one in every four teens were in 2010, according Dr. Drew and Smart Moves, Smart Choices, an awareness initiative.

The organization has paired up with the man on the frontlines of battling addiction, Dr. Drew Pinsky. Huff Post Parents talked to him about a missed connection between suicidal thoughts and Xanax, why parents need a lockbox instead of a medicine cabinet and the number one sign of drug abuse.

There's been such a huge surge in the abuse of prescription drugs. How did we get here?

Kids aren't dumb: if they have a genuine perception that something to harmful to them, they're less likely to use it. But, their pre-fontal cortex -- the part of the brain that perceives consequences -- isn't fully developed. The casualness with which pills are used in our houses is sending a message to them.

How so?

Our general attitude toward prescription drugs is that they're going to make our lives happier and better. Pills are designed to treat medical problems, not to make life easier. [Adults think] you can use these things without consequences, and adolescents don't see the long-term horizon.

[Among teens] there's a general note of, What's the big deal? They're given by doctors, mom and dad use them, how harmful could they be? And oh by the way, they really do get me high. They work, and I can steal them right out of my own medicine cabinet. I don't have to go get them from the guy on the street corner!

Then how are teens getting their hands on the pills?

Sixty-four percent of [drugs come from] from a friend or relative. There are a lot of pills out there lying around. Sometimes [kids are] stealing from a friend. It's so pervasive and handled so causally in the home that kids can steal an entire bottle of pills and no one notices.

Continue Reading: huffingtonpost.com

American teens hear a lot of references to alcohol brand names in popular music, a new study finds.

The references to alcohol brands, which are most common in rap, R&B and hip hop songs, are often associated with the depiction of a luxury lifestyle that includes partying and risky behavior, such as violence, drug use and degrading sexual activity, according to the University of Pittsburgh researchers.

For the study, the investigators analyzed 793 of the most popular songs among youths between 2005 and 2007 and discovered that about 25 percent of the songs that mention alcohol also mention a specific alcohol brand.

The researchers calculated that there were about 3.4 alcohol brand references in every one hour's worth of songs. The average teen hears about 2.5 hours of popular music a day, which means they have substantial exposure to alcohol brand references in songs.

Continue Reading: usnews.com

By John Richardson

The newest drug to help treat opiate addiction is now being sold by drug dealers and abused by addicts in Portland and other Maine communities.

"It seems to be everywhere in Portland," said Ronni Katz, coordinator of Portland Public Health's Substance Abuse Prevention Program.

The drug, Suboxone, is prescribed by federally licensed physicians who are trained to treat opiate addiction.

It contains buprenorphine, a synthetic opiate that controls cravings, and naloxone, an opiate blocker that is intended to prevent users from getting high and discourage abuse.

While considered a breakthrough in helping addicts break their dependence on oxycodone and other opiate-based pain medications, Suboxone pills are now turning up alongside crack cocaine and oxycodone in seizures from drug dealers. And Suboxone sublingual tablets, thin strips that dissolve under the tongue, have become the most popular illicit drug in jails and prisons because they are easy to smuggle, in the flaps of manila envelopes and greeting cards.

In Portland, Katz said, many users are dissolving and injecting Suboxone into their veins. They apparently have figured out how to remove the naloxone from the drug and get high, she said. "When you're an addict, you become a chemist."

Chuck Lawson, a recovering addict in Portland, said Suboxone was one in a series of drugs that he got hooked on, after heroin and OxyContin.

"That was the next drug. Everybody was using it," Lawson said.

Some experts argue that Suboxone users on the street are mostly self-medicating to avoid withdrawal until they can get a more powerful drug or get into a treatment program. The state's shortage of treatment programs may be contributing to the abuse, they say.

Continue Reading: pressherald.com

by Kyle Anderson

Eminem hasn't exactly avoided the topic of his relationship with a variety of illicit chemicals. After all, his last two albums were called Relapse and Recovery. But the man born Marshall Mathers has rarely been as candid about his struggles with addiction in the press.

In the pages of GQ, where he was named a "God of Rock" next to the likes of Keith Richards and Robert Plant, Em let the world know exactly why he is so prone to addiction. "I'm very much a creature of habit," he told GQ. "If I'm used to waking up in the morning and having [a Red Bull], I could do it every morning for the next ten years straight until I find something else to move on to. So if I'm used to taking a Vicodin when I wake up in the morning because I'm hungover from ­drinking or taking pills ... The bigger the crowd, the bigger my habit got."

Eminem also explained that his drug problems could be traced over the course of his discography, noting that The Slim Shady LP was written almost entirely sober, the dark experiments on The Marshall Mathers LP were the result of more experimentation with substances, and Encore was hampered both artistically and practically thanks to his addiction to prescription medication (including Valium and Ambien).

After a failed stint in rehab ("Every addict in rehab feels like everyone's staring at them. With me? Everyone was staring at me"), he had a traumatic overdose experience and finally made the decision to get clean when he realized he was killing himself. "I had a feeling in my arm that was weird, man," he said. "Like, it really freaked me out. So I went to some people I trust and said, 'Look, I know I need help. I'm ready now.' I got a room in the same hospital where I overdosed, and I detoxed."

Continue Reading: music-mix.ew.com

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) -- Colombian model Angie Sanclemente declared her innocence Tuesday as her cocaine-smuggling trial began in Argentina.

The case against Sanclemente and six others alleges that she and her Argentine boyfriend recruited beautiful young women to smuggle drugs to the Mexican resort of Cancun en route to Europe for $5,000 a trip.

The probe began when one of the suspects was allegedly caught in the Buenos Aires international airport with 121 pounds (55 kilos) of cocaine.

The former Colombian Coffee Queen says she came to Argentina to get married, not to commit crimes.

"I'm not interested in dirty business," Sanclemente declared, and clarified that she considers herself an actress, not a model.

Continue Reading: google.com

By Lisa A. Flam

Have you been offered a glass of wine during playgroup or been tempted to crack open a beer during pizza night with your kids and their friends?

Or when that joyous of times arrives - bedtime - and it's finally time to unwind, is the cocktail shaker the first thing you reach for?

The issue of mothers and alcohol has been percolating for several years, with stories about parents bringing babies to bars or serving wine alongside juice boxes during playdates.

One of the most tragic results of drinking while parenting came in 2009, when a New York mother crashed her minivan while driving drunk in the wrong direction on a highway, killing herself, four children in her van and three men in another car. How could she do this, many wondered.

The question of drinking on the job of motherhood arises again in the Missouri mystery of a missing 10-month-old girl, Lisa Irwin. She vanished from her home two weeks ago on a night when her mother, Deborah Bradley, said she got drunk and may have blacked out after Lisa was in bed, and her two half-brothers were lying down to watch a movie. 

When her husband returned home from work early the next day, he found the front door unlocked, several lights on and a tampered window screen. Lisa was gone.

Bradley, who denies any wrongdoing, defended her actions by saying she drinks only after her kids are in bed.  

Continue Reading: msn.com

By Mark Whitaker

With spring break nearing, my mother contacted my father and arranged for Paul and me to visit him again in Princeton. He suggested that we arrive on a Sunday, and since she had a class to teach the next day, she told us that she would drive us as far as New York and put us on a train the rest of the way. When we got to Penn Station, she bought us two tickets, and half an hour later Paul and I got off at Princeton Junction and started looking around the little station for my father.

He was nowhere to seen.

A middle-aged white couple walked over to us.

"Do you remember me?" the man asked. "I'm Hube Wilson, an old friend of your dad's."

"Yes," I said. "We met you in California a long time ago."

"I remember it well," he said. "But I had a different wife then."

"I'm his new wife," the woman said, putting out her hand. "I knew you too when you both were little boys. My name is Gina."

I didn't remember her.

"Where's Dad?" I asked.

"He's under the weather," Hube said. "He asked us to pick you up. He'll be at home when you get there."

The Wilsons grabbed our duffel bags and took us to their car. It was an ordinary sedan, not the VW bus I remembered from Venice. They did their best to make small talk, remarking on how much we had grown and asking how we liked school. But it was awkward, and Hube no longer matched the matinee idol image I had of him in my mind. His hair had gone white and his face was etched with deep wrinkles.

When we arrived at the apartment, I noticed that the blinds were drawn. Hube rang the bell and we waited for over a minute before my father opened the door. He said hello and gave my brother and me a hug, but his embrace felt weak and he looked tired. It took several minutes before he said anything about my appearance.

Continue Reading: cnn.com

REPORTING FROM MEXICO CITY -- Soldiers have freed 61 men held against their will at a safe house in the northern state of Coahuila, the army said in a statement (link in Spanish).

The men, who included one Honduran citizen, were held with the intent to make them forced laborers for a drug gang, the military said. The rescue on Saturday recalls the case of 72 mostly Central American migrants who were massacred in August 2010, after being kidnapped and reportedly refusing to work for the Zetas cartel.

Military authorities did not say which cartel allegedly kidnapped the men in Coahuila, but the fearsome Zetas are believed to be in control of wide areas of the state. Last week, soldiers captured a high-ranking Zetas figure known as "La Rana," or "The Frog," in Saltillo, Coahuila's capital city, after intense gun battles. Carlos Oliva Castillo is said to have ordered the August torching of the Casino Royale in Monterrey, where 52 people died.

In Coahuila, Mexico's military just days ago launched "Operation Northeast," an offensive against organized crime. In the municipality of Piedras Negras, where the 61 men were found, military authorities said they also confiscated six tons of marijuana and arrested three men believed to be the prisoners' kidnappers.

Continue Reading: latimes.com

By Timothy W. Martin

Excessive drinkers aren't just racking up a tab at their favorite pub or liquor store.

Heavy boozers cost the U.S. economy more than $220 billion in 2006 from lost work productivity, increased health care costs and law enforcement, according to a study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"Binge drinking also leads to binge spending," said CDC Director Thomas Frieden on a teleconference with reporters.

The costs from excessive drinking totaled $1.90 per drink and averaged out to $746 per person in the U.S., according to the study. Data from 2006 were the most recent available.

Research from 1998 estimated the costs of excessive drinking then at around $185 billion.

Excessive alcohol consumption is defined as averaging more than a drink per day, binge drinking -- four or more drinks for women and five or more for men on a single occasion -- or any alcohol consumption at all by pregnant women or underage youth.

The research, Frieden said, highlighted the costs incurred by drinkers beyond the damage to their own wallets. About $94.2 billion, or 42%, of the total economic costs were government dollars. Families, mostly through lost household income, bore more than $90 billion in costs.

The study focused solely on the financial impact of drinking way too mjch. Previous CDC research has shown that a moderate alcohol intake is linked to health benefits. But "there are essentially no health benefits with excessive drinking," says Robert Brewer, who leads the CDC's alcohol program.

Binge drinkers represented about three-quarters of the societal costs of excessive drinking, even though they make up about 15% of the total population, Frieden said.

Continue Reading: wsj.com

By Maia Szalavitz
A new study suggests that in hard economic times, people drink more alcohol. Intuitively, it might make sense, but the findings run counter to most previous research, which shows that alcoholism and other drinking-related problems tend to decline along with the economy.

For the new study, researchers at University of Miami looked at the connections between risky drinking and state unemployment rates in a sample of more than 43,000 people surveyed between 2001 and 2005. That was before the current economic crisis, but because the health of individual states' economies varied during that time, researchers could make comparisons between them.

The study found that each 1% increase in the state unemployment rate corresponded to a nearly 17% increase in cases of alcoholism or alcohol abuse and a 35% increase in rates of drunk driving.

"We are one of the first to show that, even though incomes decline for most people during an economic downtown, they still increase problematic or risky drinking," lead author Michael French, director of the Health Economics Research Group at the University of Miami, said in a statement.

Most previous studies have found that when income takes a dive, so does drinking -- alcohol is expensive, so people are less able to afford it when they lose their jobs. A large number of studies have also found that increasing the price of alcohol leads to reduced consumption, even among heavy drinkers.

"It is clear just from examining the per-capita consumption trends that during the Great Depression of 1929 and after, in country after country in conditions of a major depression, the alcohol consumption dropped radically," says Robin Room, chair of social research in alcohol at the University of Melbourne in Australia, a long time researcher in this area.

Continue Reading: healthland.time.com

By RANDY KREIDER
Drug smugglers are endlessly creative when it comes to inventing ways to move marijuana, cocaine and other contraband from Mexico into the United States.

In the latest innovation uncovered by law enforcement, smugglers in the border town of Nogales, Arizona were bringing drugs into the U.S. for the cost of a quarter.

The parking meters on International Street, which hugs the border fence in Nogales, cost 25 cents. Smugglers in Mexico tunneled under the fence and under the metered parking spaces, and then carefully cut neat rectangles out of the pavement. Their confederates on the U.S. side would park false-bottomed vehicles in the spaces above the holes, feed the meters, and then wait while the underground smugglers stuffed their cars full of drugs from below.

When the exchange was finished, the smugglers would use jacks to put the pavement "plugs" back into place. The car would drive away, and only those observers who were looking closely would notice the seams in the street.

Continue Reading: yahoo.com

Richard Dreyfuss remembers his sobriety date at Oklahoma City event

The Oscar winner was the keynote speaker Tuesday at a fundraising dinner for the Oklahoma Outreach Foundation, a nonprofit organization that supports treatment and recovery programs for state teens coping with chemical dependency on alcohol and other drugs.

Three decades later, Richard Dreyfuss still attributes both magic and meaning to his sobriety date: Nov. 19, 1982.

"It's my daughter's birthday, and there's more magic attached to that sentence than I can possibly begin to tell you. But suffice to it say that one year ... before my daughter was born, I was upside down with my head on the pavement with a Mercedes Benz on top of me. And I was held in by a safety belt that I hadn't put on," Dreyfuss told an Oklahoma City audience Tuesday night.

"I spent the next 10 days in absolute and complete denial. I am an expert on denial, and I did my level best to not see the inevitable consequence of my acts. Except I couldn't shake the image of this little girl that was in my mind's eye, and every day she got clearer and clearer until on the 19th I said, enough. And she disappeared and didn't reappear for one year. She was my daughter."

The Oscar winner was the keynote speaker Tuesday night at the Oklahoma Outreach Foundation's "An Evening of Courage & Inspiration." The charity dinner at the Skirvin Hotel raised $212,000 for the nonprofit organization, which supports treatment and recovery programs for state teens coping with chemical dependency on alcohol and other drugs.

Continue Reading: newsok.com

THE number of drug cheats is soaring as dopers tap into a new performance-enhancing substance.

A spike in athletes caught using methylhexaneamine has been blamed for the record number of doping violations.

In the past year the Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority (ASADA) nabbed 19 people using the stimulant, which is used in bodybuilding, dietary supplements and party drugs.

The stimulant contributed to the highest number of violations in ASADA's history, the results revealed in its 2010-11 annual report.

ASADA chief executive Aurora Andruska said the outcome for Australian athletes could have been "much worse", but for a major public announcement warning the drug was being increasingly detected in dietary supplements.

"We must remain vigilant as there are still athletes testing positive for this stimulant around the world, so we want to remind athletes to be very careful about what they consume," Ms Andruska said.

Most of the positive tests for methylhexaneamine involved rugby league players and weightlifters, with 13 violations.

Deakin University public health expert Dr Matthew Dunn said several athletes had taken the prohibited substance in various dietary supplements.

"I don't think it's anything that people are especially sourcing, like speed, it's one of these things that just pops up in supplements and so forth."

Continue Reading: heraldsun.com 

Sports minister Hugh Robertson has pledged to do everything in his power to keep British sport clean of drugs.

The Conservative MP was talking at the launch of anti-doping campaign Win Clean: Say No to Doping in London's Trafalgar Square. The campaign, managed by UK Anti-Doping, is a partnership between the London organising committee (LOCOG), World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and Department of Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (DCMS).

Win Clean aims to alert athletes heading to London 2012 to their rights and responsibilities surrounding anti-doping and Robertson believes it is a vital step to ensuring the Games are clean.

'This is important to me for three reasons,' he said. 'Operational, political and international reasons.

'In operational terms as the minister responsible for the 2012 Games, I want these to be a clean Games.

'I am delighted we are supported by London 2012 and UKAD in order to do everything possible to make sure that these Games are drug-free. That is the really important operational mission.

'There is also a political message that comes in over the top of that, which is that I want this country to be a drug-free country in sport.

'I will do everything I can while I am a minister to ensure British policy is orientated to ensure that sport is fair and, particularly, free of drugs.

Continue Reading: dailymail.co.uk

By Marc Lifsher

The Fresh & Easy grocery chain has to fix what it calls a nonexistent problem, now that Gov. Jerry Brown has signed a bill banning the sale of alcoholic beverages at self-service checkout stands.

Brown, just before midnight Sunday, approved a proposal that forces the British-owned chain, with more than 125 stores in California, to shift from an all-automated format to one that has at least one clerk on hand to check a purchaser's age before ringing up sales of beer and wine.

The bill was one of 466 signed by the governor since the Legislature recessed for the year Sept. 9. He has vetoed 97 measures.

Among dozens of new business and labor laws were measures to extend a $100-million tax credit for the film industry for a year and to ban pre-employment credit checks in most circumstances.

He vetoed bills that would have forced Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and several big-box chains to conduct economic impact studies before building stores, and would have restricted bank fees on debit cards that employers use for wages.

The alcoholic beverage sales bill, AB 183, requires face-to-face interaction at Fresh & Easy and all other supermarkets to prevent sales to underage consumers. It was supported by law enforcement and groups that treat alcohol abuse.

"Underage drinking costs California taxpayers an estimated $8.1 billion annually," said the bill's author, Assemblywoman Fiona Ma (D-San Francisco). "AB 183 will help prevent alcohol from getting in young hands."

Continue Reading: latimes.com

By Brian M. Rosenthal

On a statewide survey administered in 2006, nearly four in 10 Nathan Hale High School sophomores said they had consumed alcohol within the past month.

Last year, only about half as many sophomores gave that answer, a 19 percentage point drop -- and significantly lower than the state average.

The change in student behavior took center stage Monday night as members of Prevention Works in Seattle (Prevention WINS), a community coalition formed to tackle teenage drinking in Northeast Seattle, celebrated their successes and discussed how to apply their methods to the rest of the city.

"It's important for the kids to be commended for making good choices," Roosevelt High School parent Mia Doces said before the "Celebrate Healthy Youth" event at Nathan Hale. "It's important to know that the things we are doing are working."

Prevention WINS helps fund drug-prevention officers and research-based alcohol-prevention programs in Northeast Seattle middle and high schools, works with police to combat drug use and teaches parents how to talk to their children about alcohol abuse, Doces said.

Continue Reading: seattletimes.com 

By Nick Miroff,

BELIZE CITY, Belize -- The sleepy port towns, mangrove swamps and jungle airstrips of poorly defended, tiny Belize are becoming prime gateways for drug trafficking as Mexico's billionaire mafias carve out new smuggling routes through Central America.

Using light aircraft and ultra-fast boats, traffickers are moving more and more South American cocaine through Belize into Mexico, U.S. narcotics agents and Belizean officials say.

By landing their lucrative cargo in Belize, the traffickers avoid detection by beefed-up Mexican army and navy patrols, marking the latest advance by the Mexican cartels into Central America's impoverished, weak states, through which as much as 90 percent of the cocaine that reaches the United States now passes, according to U.S. assessments.

Belize's growing role as a smuggling corridor prompted the Obama administration to add it to the annual "black list" of countries considered major drug producers or transit routes for narcotics. The 22-state list, announced last month, now includes every nation in Central America, a sign that more and more territory is coming under the influence of the cartels.

U.S. officials estimate that about 10 metric tons of cocaine are smuggled along Belize's Caribbean coast each year en route to American consumers, the world's most voracious illicit drug users. Additional loads arrive on flights from Colombia and Venezuela, landing on Belize's farm roads and highways, where the shipments can be quickly unpacked, broken down into smaller bundles and ferried across the Rio Hondo into southern Mexico.

Continue Reading: washingtonpost.com 

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Candy shaped like marijuana that's showing up on store shelves around the country won't get kids high, but aghast city leaders and anti-drug activists say the product and grocers carrying it represent a new low.

"We're already dealing with a high amount of drug abuse and drug activity and trying to raise children so they don't think using illegal substances is acceptable," said City Councilmember Darius Pridgen. "So to have a licensed store sell candy to kids that depicts an illegal substance is just ignorant and irresponsible."

The "Pothead Ring Pots," ''Pothead Lollipops" and bagged candy are distributed to retail stores by the novelty supply company Kalan LP of the Philadelphia suburb of Lansdowne. It also wholesales online for $1 for a lollipop and $1.50 for a package of three rings.

Company president Andrew Kalan said the candy, on the market six to nine months and in 1,000 stores around the country, promotes the legalization of marijuana.

"It does pretty well," he said.

"This is the first complaint I've heard," Kalan said, "and people are usually not shy. I'm actually surprised this is the first."

Continue Reading: washingtonpost.com

By Diane Cardwell

With buffed hardwood floors, a fireplace in the living room, marble in the bathrooms and Silestone in the kitchen, the 2,200-square-foot, full-floor apartment on West Broadway looks exactly like the luxury condo it was meant to be. The furniture is plush and neutral, original artwork hangs on the walls, there is a Wii console hooked up to the flat-screen television and, when the sights of TriBeCa's bustle from the second-floor windows are not enough, there is a planted, furnished roof deck upstairs, with views stretching from the Empire State Building to ground zero.

But the apartment, one of five carved out of a prewar loft building between Canal and Lispenard Streets, is not a sleek new residence that has suddenly come to market. Rather, it will soon be home to a revolving population of young adults recovering from substance abuse under a program officials say is the first of its kind in New York City.

The project, called TriBeCa Twelve, is a collaboration between Hazelden, the Minnesota-based network of rehabilitation centers, and the Columbia University psychiatry department, and it represents an unusual resolution for a high-gloss condo development that went belly up.

Continue Reading: nytimes.com

ByJohn Blackstone

(CBS News)  Thousands of medical marijuana outlets in California are bracing for a federal crackdown. Prosecutors say the shops are doing more than just helping their patients.

CBS News correspondent John Blackstone reports that, for Justice Department officials, the photographs of marijuana being sold in lollipops and candy show the problem with California's medical marijuana law.

"Where there's marijuana there's money. And lots of it," said Melinda Haag, U.S. Attorney for Northern California. "People are using the cover of medical marijuana to make extraordinary amounts of money. In short, (they're) engaged in drug trafficking."

4 Americans get medical pot from the feds
Study: LA pot clinics shut down, crime went up
Complete coverage: Marijuana nation

Medical marijuana has been legal in California since voters approved it in 1996. Fifteen other states now have similar laws, but marijuana remains illegal under federal law.

Now federal officials have sent warning letters to dozens of California dispensaries telling them to shut down or risk arrest and property seizure.

Continue Reading: cbsnews.com

What's the Latest Development?

Recent brain scans have revealed that chronic alcoholism can damage the cerebellum, the part of the brain that plays an important role in regulating motor control, attention and language, says Richard Ridderinkhof, professor of neurocognitive development and aging at the University of Amsterdam. "It can also cause the prefrontal cortex to shrink and degrade, potentially impairing decision-making skills and social behavior." The white matter connecting brain regions can also be damaged.

Continue Reading: bigthink.com

SALINAS, California (CBS Newspath) Underage drinking might be found in the form of candy. Teenagers in California are now using gummy bears to get drunk. But this problem may be more widespread.

They're a sweet staple of any kid's afternoon pick me up.
But now Hollister police--who posted this warning on their facebook page today--and the San Benito County Health Department want you to know gummy bears aren't so innocent anymore.

They are soaking gummy bears with vodka and the bears soak up all the alcohol so its undetectable.

Renee Hankla said the county already knew teens in San Benito had a drinking problem three years ago.

That's why it applied for a 1.3 million dollar federal grant to prevent underage drinking.

Hankla says, "teens are very creative and intelligent and can think of ways to sneak alcohol past adults."

"They can ingest more than they know theyre ingesting because they are taking handfuls of candy and they don't know how much they've ingested so they can become pretty intoxicated pretty quickly.

Continue Reading: kmvt.com 

For the second time this year, RCMP in the southern Interior have seized a helicopter they say was used to smuggle drugs between the U.S. and Canada.

RCMP Cpl. Annie Linteau says officers arrested the 33-year-old owner for allegedly using the Bell 206 helicopter to transport cocaine from Lumby, B.C., to the United States.

"The fact that a criminal organization would purchase such a valuable vehicle for $425,000 just to move illicit drugs across the border underscores the actual value of the illicit drug movement across our shared border," said Linteau.

Members of the Nelson RCMP Border Integrity Program monitored the helicopter's movements for two years before arresting the owner and seizing the chopper in May.

Continue Reading: cbc.ca

By Rachel Quigley
The imprisoned son of actor Michael Douglas testified against his former drug supplier on Tuesday as well as describing to the court how his former defence lawyer would smuggle drugs into jail for him in her bra after they started a relationship.
Cameron Douglas, 32, also told a federal jury in Manhattan that he would have been better off staying in jail rather than being freed on bail after he was arrested in New York on drug charges two years ago.
He said that he learned only when he returned to federal prison that the U.S. Bureau of Prisons treats drug-addicted inmates when they arrive.

Instead, he was freed on bail after his arrest in July 2009 for dealing methamphetamine from a high-end Manhattan hotel.
It was after this arrest that he said he 'got into a relationship' with his lawyer.
The two shared clandestine kisses behind bars and she used a balloon to smuggle dozens of Xanax anti-anxiety pills into the Metropolitan Correctional Center in downtown Manhattan, according to the New York Post.

Continue Reading: dailymail.co.uk

The aging boomer population -- which is now facing financial strain, job loss, declining health, and grieving the death of a parent -- has some addiction experts concerned.

"As Baby Boomers enter a transitional stage in their lives, [those] new stressors...make them more prone to depression and anxiety," Dr. Barbara Krantz of the nonprofit Hanley Center addiction treatment facility said Wednesday in a statement, NewsMax.com reported.

That depression and anxiety is fueling both substance abuse and other behavioral addictions, such as hoarding and compulsive gambling, experts say.

According to Tampa Bay Online, government reports show an estimated three million American seniors suffer from alcoholism or drug dependency. That number is estimated to triple by 2020 as baby boomers continue to age, according to the report.

Continue Reading: huffingtonpost.com

By Scott Glover and Lisa Girion

As California's top prescriber of narcotic painkillers and other commonly abused drugs, Dr. Nazar Al Bussam made hundreds of thousands of dollars feeding the addictions of strung-out patients who packed into his offices in Downey and Los Angeles, according to authorities.

Federal prosecutors concluded it was "pure luck" that his reckless prescribing had not resulted in any known deaths.

A Los Angeles Times review of coroners' records, however, reveals that at least three of the doctor's patients died of drug overdoses in 2007 and 2008. Two other people died -- one from an overdose, the other by falling off a cliff -- with drugs in their systems and pill bottles bearing Al Bussam's name in their possession.

Photos: Five who died

A judge is expected to sentence Al Bussam on Wednesday. Prosecutors have asked for nearly 20 years in prison for the 71-year-old physician, arguing that his conduct was worse than that of a street corner drug dealer.

"Unlike a street dealer, defendant well understood the effects of the poison he peddled," wrote Assistant U.S. Attys. Ariel A. Neuman and Benjamin R. Barron.

Al Bussam, who graduated from the University of Baghdad College of Medicine in 1963 and began practicing in California more than three decades ago, is the latest in a string of Southern California physicians accused of violating their oaths by dealing drugs. The charges come amid a prescription drug epidemic that recently pushed drugs ahead of traffic accidents as a cause of death nationwide.

Continue Reading: latimes.com