HEROIN'S HELL

As Addicts Die In Alleys, Call Goes Out To Address Overdoses

WILMINGTON -- Robert I. Bovell Jr.'s eyes flickered down briefly
before he said how police found his brother.

"Face-down on the ground in an alley at Second and Broom ... dead
from an overdose with the fresh needle marks in his arm."

The death of 38-year-old Neil "Jai" Bovell, of Wilmington -- one of
seven Delaware fatalities tied to a purer-than-usual batch of heroin
and the painkiller fentanyl -- is a scenario experts say is being
repeated nationwide. Advertisement

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More than 30 people have been killed by such overdoses across the
country since mid-April -- 15 in Philadelphia alone -- and hundreds
more have been hospitalized, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency.

"This is murder in the first degree," said New Castle County
Councilman Jea Street.

Law enforcement and other agencies must use whatever resources are
needed to "get these murderers and this killer drug off the street,"
he said, but the solution must be found beyond city, county or state levels.

In separate appeals Wednesday, the Interdenominational Ministers
Action Council in Wilmington and a group of city, county, state and
federal law enforcement and service agencies -- led by Mayor James M.
Baker -- urged unity behind efforts to educate the public about
deadly risks of heroin and to help users get recovery services they need.

New Castle County paramedics have responded with police and
firefighters to more than 100 suspected overdoses since the rash
began, said Chief Lawrence E. Tan, chief of the county's Emergency
Medical Services.

Many of the calls -- all requiring full response and advanced life
support -- come in as cardiac arrest, breathing difficulties, loss of
consciousness or car accidents, and each one is a case of life and
death, he said.

Cracking down on sources

Wilmington Police Department Inspector Martin Donahue said officers
have been interviewing those who survive overdoses -- and many drug
arrests and seizures have resulted, including one dealer arrested
April 28 in possession of bags of pure fentanyl.

State prosecutor Steve Wood said heroin users need to know they are
making a dangerous choice -- one which could kill them -- when they
choose to use the drug.

To dealers, he said, "We're coming after you, we're going to catch
you and we're going to put you away."

Assistant special agent in the Drug Enforcement Agency Barbara Roach
said the federal agency also is "aggressively pursuing" the sources
of the drugs.

Roach, in charge of the Philadelphia Field Division including
Delaware, said Philadelphia has had more than 70 overdoses and 15
deaths; Harrisburg had 20 overdoses and four deaths, and Camden,
N.J., had 70-plus overdoses, six deaths. Many involved fentanyl, she
said, adding, "It's about 100 times more potent than morphine."

Days in Shooters Alley

"The medical examiner said, he told me there was no heroin in him,"
Bovell said, walking to where his brother died. "It was pure fentanyl
in his system."

His brother was found at about 7:30 a.m. April 25 in the alley
between boarded, vacant houses in the 200 block of Broom St. Police
went there after a neighbor complained of a foul odor. Another
neighbor said she saw him go back into the alley two days earlier.

"They call this Shooters Alley," Robert Bovell said, walking on empty
drug bags, plastic beverage caps used to heat heroin and discarded
lighters. He stepped over other debris ranging from human feces to
condoms, and window boards pulled from buildings by those who would
find shelter inside after their highs wore off.

In this spot, backed by a park where neighbors say drugs are common,
Bovell said his brother sat on the back stoop of a house where a
little old lady once kept a tidy home and lovely gardens.

"He was like this," Robert Bovell said, leaning over as if holding a
syringe in one hand to his other arm -- the junkie's pose. "One to
eight seconds, he was dead," Bovell said.

From other heroin users who attended his brother's funeral Saturday
and from interviewing people he knows from his work as a bail
bondsman, Robert Bovell said he learned his brother may have been
there with a young woman who took the needle and left. When he tried
to track her down to find out where the drugs came from, Bovell said
he learned that she, too, was dead of an overdose.

Wilmington police said they could not confirm those details, but are
investigating the possible link between Bovell's death and that of
Weslyn Baldwin, 25, found dead Friday in her Hockessin-area home.

Hoping to spare others such grief and help users stop drugs, Bovell
joined the ministers' call to action Wednesday.

Clergy get involved

The ministers called for more community policing, employment and
recreation programs, and federal action to fight the flow of illegal
drugs. And they said action is needed now, before more lives are lost
and summer idleness leads more young people into drug dealing, use
and addiction.

"There is a serial killer loose in our community," said the Rev.
Silvester Beaman.

Renee Beaman, director of the Beautiful Gate Outreach Center, said
the recent overdoses also point out "the direct connection between
heroin use and the risk of HIV infection."

The Rev. H. Ward Greer, ministers council president and pastor of
Ezion-Mount Carmel United Methodist Church, where the group met
Wednesday, said Delaware's most-recent overdose death was next door
to the 201-year-old church.

Driving into the church lot Tuesday, Greer saw a body in the lot
beyond a fence, "and I knew what I saw lying on the ground was one of
the victims of this so-called 'laced heroin.' "

The Rev. Maurice Moyer said stopping the trend will require
international muscle on supplying countries.

He, the Rev. Tyrone Johnson and others also offered condolences to
the Bovells and other grieving families, and encouraged Delawareans
to support them -- as well as those still suffering in addiction --
with compassion and prayer.

A difficult life

Jai Bovell was getting in trouble before he quit high school. His
issues were drug-related, petty crime, threatening folks who owed him
money. Many times, his brother searched for him, sometimes finding
him in Shooters Alley.

Robert Bovell said his brother just got out of jail April 21, after
serving six months for violating probation on a charge from the 1980s.

Robert Bovell said his brother told him he was ready to fix his life
-- and Robert Bovell believed him.

In Mexico for work, Robert Bovell had his staff post his brother's
bail. He planned to help him get into a drug rehab program when he
got home, but his trip ended early with the call his brother was
dead. Now, despite the family's grief, Bovell said, "at least I know
where he is. ... He's in a better place."