VIDEO EXPLORES METH'S DEVASTATION

In the shocking 18-minute video Death By Jib, kids swear, twitch and writhe
in classic junkie style. They shoot crystal meth into weeping sores on
their arms.

The film details loss, sexual exploitation, mental devastation and lonely
death in a squalid hotel room.

This is no after-school special.

But, says co-producer Kevin Letourneau, that's the whole point of this
presentation on life as a crystal-meth addict.

(Death By Jib will be shown at all four community forums being organized by
The Province in conjunction with this current series).

The video takes viewers on to the street to witness the horror where it
actually happens.

"It's way better to have an in-your-face video," says Letourneau, Peace
Arch Community Services counselling program manager. Teens are less likely
to dismiss a message from an authority figure if it's delivered in a way
they can relate to by people of their own age, he says.

The idea for the video came in the fall of 2004 as Letourneau became aware
of a steady increase in youth needing help with meth addiction.

His inspiration was a 1999 film, Wrath of the Dragon, a production of
Coquitlam film maker Michael Neitzel that dealt with heroin abuse. It was a
no-holds barred journey into the heroin-junkie underworld -- with addicts
as the guides.

Letourneau called Neitzel and "we immediately connected over the phone," he
says.

With $25,000 from the Fraser Health Authority, Death By Jib was quickly put
into production.

Letourneau and Neitzel interviewed users from Whalley, Vancouver, Surrey
and Abbotsford. The work paid off. Letourneau and Neitzel found teens,
young adults, even the mother of a man who committed suicide while coming
off meth, to talk graphically about their experiences.

The interviews are stark and uncompromising.

"I haven't seen my family in five years," says one teen.

"[Addiction] is like a little box you're trapped in . . . worms that eat
your brain," says another.

A Grade 9 girl tells how she started using meth because she was told it
would help her lose weight.

"All the guys would love me, I'd be skinny and popular," she says. "I
looked basically like a rack."

The Fraser Health Authority now has 60 copies to distribute to mental
health centres and counselling centres.

For information on how to screen Death By Jib, contact Maureen Hamblin,
director of community relations for Peace Arch Community Services, at
604-531-6226.

To buy a copy, call 1-800-263-6910, or go to kineticvideo.com.