DRUGS AND THE DAUGHTER THEY NEVER HAD

Gillian Staple's Family Tried To Find Help For Her Problems At A Private
U.S. Facility

Up to Grade 6, Gillian Staple's life was the normal stuff of growing up on
the North Shore.

There were family vacations to Disneyland, Arizona, the Okanagan and
camping trips with her extended family. She played hockey and ringette,
hung out with friends and was described as a cheerful and gregarious leader
by her classmates.

But things changed when she was 12. Her popularity provoked envy and
suddenly she was targeted by bullies who relentlessly sought her out for
punishment.

Things at home changed too. Her dad, Greg Staple, was transferred to
Calgary but the rest of the family stayed behind in North Vancouver so
Gillian's older sister Allison could finish Grade 12 in the high school
where she had been voted class president and was on the honour roll. That
same fall, Alzheimer's forced Gillian's beloved grandmother into a nursing
home.

With all of the other stresses and strains Gillian began to question where
she belonged in the world and why her birth mother had put her up for adoption.

Desperate for friends, she started hanging out with kids who were
experimenting with drugs.

In January 2001, Gillian's drug use was out of control and so was she. She
beat up her mother, Marion, and was placed in foster care. There, Gillian
began a new phase. Even though her parents were more than willing to
re-establish their relationship, it was tough slogging, made worse by
Gillian's drug addiction, her running away, suicide attempts, a pimp and
prostitution.

From the time Gillian was put into foster care in January 2001, she kept a
diary. Her parents photocopied one page of the worn book and provided it to
The Sun because they felt it so aptly described Gillian's frustrations with
herself and with a system that was failing her.

Written in a spiral, the plea for help circles around the top of a lined
page into a tight centre.

Gillian titled it The Cycle.

"I FEEL like I am in a cycle one that just keeps spinning around and around
I feel that I am stuck and I can't get out of my spinning spiral can
someone help me I am lost confused with the world I would take drugs [at]
any cost! I've slit my wrists and hurt myself and I've also hurt everyone
else help me help me help me HELP."

If there was any good news in mid-September 2001, it was that the ministry
of children and family development had ruled out the possibility that
Gillian had fetal alcohol syndrome or fetal alcohol effect. The bad news?
It made the diagnosis on the basis of a conversation with her birth mother.

On Saturday, Sept. 17, Greg ran into Gillian at the Maplewood Market near
the Second Narrows Bridge. They had a brief conversation. Gillian hugged
him when he left.

But the following day Gillian was back at Lions Gate Hospital because she'd
threatened suicide. She saw a psychiatrist and suddenly everyone was keen
to expedite her admission to the Maples -- a residential psychiatric
assessment centre for youth in Burnaby -- to late September.

But days after her admittance, there was more chilling news in an e-mail
from care worker Miem Swart.

Each night, Gillian's pimp was picking her up from the Maples and taking
her to work the street.

Each night, the staff let her go even though Gillian had told them she was
frightened and that her pimp had threatened to kill her if she didn't go.

But because there is no law that allows the ministry, a parent or even
police to hold youths against their will if they haven't committed a crime,
and because in Canada prostitution is legal, the staff had to let her go.

In early October Gillian and a couple of boys who were also at the Maples
for assessment, walked away from the institution. They were in the street
when Gillian threw a yogurt carton at a truck. The driver stopped and a
couple of guys got out. Gillian was assaulted and one of the boys beaten up.

Because she'd run away, Maples' staff had a reason to lock Gillian in at
night and, according to Swart, Gillian was "actually relieved."

"The plan is that she will stay the weekend as well for her own
protection," Swart wrote in an e-mail to Gillian's parents. "I hope they
manage to keep her there ... If she does manage to 'escape' the police will
be notified and the police will be looking for her because her life is
really in danger with this new info. How much of this is actually true and
how much Gill is just saying we of course do not know."

Greg's notes from a meeting with the Maples staff on Nov. 2 provide a
snapshot of Gillian's new life.

By now, her face was scarred by cigarette burns. She was smoking almost
constantly to calm her anxieties. She was using LSD, marijuana and drinking.

She slept and ate erratically. She lived in constant fear that her pimp
would fulfil his promise to kill her.

Not surprisingly, Gillian was described as distrusting of adults, including
her parents.

Despite all that, Gillian still had a dream. She wanted to go to acting
school and become an actor.

After nearly a year in the ministry's care and while she was still at the
Maples, Gillian wrote this note:

"To whoever this may concerne: "I have been living in the ministry's care
for more than a year or something and I have found that I realy do not like
the living environment of group homes, adolescent centers or foster homes.
I really really would like to stay in my parent's care. I feel safe and
happier their."

In mid-December, Gillian went home. Yet despite her letter and her
voluntary return to her parent's North Vancouver home, the ministry went to
court in January 2002 to have its temporary custody order extended six months.

Greg contested the application on the grounds that since entering ministry
care Gillian had withdrawn from school, become an alcoholic and street drug
user, a prostitute and pursued a "high-risk life on the street."

"By any measure, this is a dismal record of performance on the part of the
ministry which was charged by the court to provide a reasonable level of
care," he told the court, adding, "Gillian's quality of life has gone
progressively downhill since entering the care of the ministry."

The day Greg went to court in February, Marion was in Salt Lake City
getting her first look at Youthcare, an intensive residential
rehabilitation program just outside of the city. That visit convinced her
that it was the kind of program her daughter desperately needed.

One of the biggest difficulties the Staples had faced in getting treatment
for Gillian in B.C. was her right to refuse treatment. In A couple of
nights later, police were called to the apartment by neighbours complaining
about the noise, partying and fights. Gillian had been beaten up by her new
boyfriend, who then decided to take on the police officers who'd come to
investigate.

Police arrested him, charged him with assaulting a police officer
[Gillian's a minor - we can't identify her as a victim under the YOA]. The
police also asked for and got a restraining order forbidding him from
seeing Gillian.

But on Thursday, April 17, Greg got a call at work from Victoria police.
Gillian's boyfriend had been arrested for kicking in a window in the hostel
where the pair were staying. The officers noticed the restraining order and
wanted the Staples to go and pick up Gillian. Police agreed to hold Gillian
overnight to give the Staples time to go over and pick her up.

On Good Friday Greg and Marion went to Victoria, picked her up and drove
their car back on to the ferry. But Gillian bolted and despite the efforts
of the Staples and B.C. Ferries staff, they couldn't find her anywhere on
the ferry.

Only later did Gillian admit to her parents that she'd convinced somebody
to let her hide in their vehicle and then taken a ride out to Langley with
the helpful stranger.

But at the months' end, it seemed there was a chance of a breakthrough.

Gillian called Greg at work from a gas station on Commercial Drive.

"She called and said she was dying. She was very ill," Marion said. Gillian
wanted to come home.

She arrived home, took a shower and went straight to bed, where she stayed
for three days.

While her mother fed her nutrient-rich drinks, tried to get her to eat and
take the lithium that had been prescribed for her, Gillian steadfastly
refused to say where she had been and who she had been with.

After a few days, Gillian told her mother she was going out with friends.
She didn't return home, but called the next day. That was May 4.

"She said, 'Hi Mum, I'm sorry I didn't call last night, but I'll be home in
an hour. I love you,'" Marion recalled.

Gillian's parents are still anxiously waiting.

They have sprinkled the city with home-made missing posters. They call
police daily. They have heard nothing.

"I just have one goal," Marion said. "I just want to hear her say 'Mum, I'm
alive.'"