POTENT PAIN PILL TAKES TOLL ON YOUNG LIVES

Matthew Kaminer was one week away from finals in his freshman year at
the University of Florida.

Bright and energetic, his first year away at school had been a good one.
He had made friends, pledged a fraternity and was ready to wrap things
up and head home to Boca Raton for a summer job.

On April 20, 2000, he celebrated the Passover Seder with friends and
went to a birthday party at his fraternity house. The 18-year-old had a
few drinks - including a glass of Seder wine - and later popped an
innocent looking pill handed to him by a friend.

The next day, he was dead.

The pill was an 80-milligram dose of OxyContin, a potent pain killer.
The drug, a savior to those in intense pain, has become known as a
killer by those who abuse it.

Kaminer was among the first wave of OxyContin deaths in Florida. Now his
mother hopes the dangers of the drug are known and that young people
will take heed.

``I know kids drink, it's not news to me. I know kids experiment with
drugs, but this is something different,'' Lillian Kaminer said. ``This
is like being handed a loaded gun and not knowing what it is.''

Life as they knew it ended for two other young men that night, too. Ying
Che ``Dan'' Lo was a pharmacy student and part-time employee at an
Eckerd Drugs store in Gainesville. Naeem Diamond Lakhani was Matthew
Kaminer's new friend and fraternity brother. They were both 19.

On June 4, the two will go before a judge in Gainesville to answer to
manslaughter charges in Kaminer's death. They each face up to 15 years
in prison.

Lo is charged with stealing the OxyContin from the drugstore and giving
two pills to his roommate, Lakhani, who gave a pill to his fraternity
brother. Kaminer died in his sleep at the Alpha Epsilon Pi fraternity
house.

``There is no way any of these kids had any idea of the potency involved
or that it could have resulted in anyone's death or it never would have
happened,'' said Ben Hutson, the Gainesville lawyer who represents Lo.

Few knew the dangers then.

OxyContin burst onto the national stage this spring with warnings from
law enforcement and public health officials about the deadly results of
misusing the synthetic morphine.

Prompted by reports of more than 120 deaths nationwide, drug maker
Purdue Pharma has suspended shipments of its largest dose, the 160-
milligram tablet, and made steps to make people more aware of the drug's
dangers.

``This is equally dangerous to you as if you had put that big ol' ugly
word `heroin' on it,'' said Alachua County State Attorney William
Cervone, who is prosecuting the two students in Kaminer's death.

``If we would call these things poisons instead of drugs, some people
would get the idea.''