HEROIN FOLLOWS I-43 INTO NORTHERN WISCONSIN, UPPER PENINSULA

Port Washington - Heroin is normally considered an urban drug. But
Ozaukee County has had more than its share of heroin-related troubles
in recent years, including several overdose deaths.

And, according to recent court cases, so have Marinette County,
population about 12,000, and Michigan's Upper Peninsula.

"If there is anyplace less likely than Ozaukee County to have a
heroin problem, I would have guessed it would be Marinette" and the
Upper Peninsula, Ozaukee County Circuit Judge Joseph D. McCormack
said when he sentenced two women from that area on heroin-trafficking charges.

"There apparently aren't any safe harbors left," McCormack said.

McCormack spoke Aug. 21 when he sentenced Jenny M. Kubiak, 36, of
Marinette to three years in prison and Sara L. Cummings, 18, of
Menominee, Mich., to one year in jail.

On Aug. 11, McCormack had sentenced one of their co-defendants,
Nicholas R. Rivard, 23, of Menominee, to three years in prison. A
fourth co-defendant, Matthew J. Bender, 22, of Marinette, is to be
sentenced Oct. 1. The state has recommended three years.

The four were arrested in Mequon in July 2007 after they bought
heroin in Chicago and were headed home. They pulled off I-43 about
1:45 a.m. in Mequon to find a place to sleep because Rivard, the only
one with a valid driver's license, was "strung out" on heroin,
according to court documents.

He was pulled over by a Mequon police officer. In the car, police
found 222 foil squares containing powdered heroin and a syringe
filled with a heroin solution, according to a criminal complaint.

The four were linked to an epidemic of narcotics use that has erupted
in that area over the last two years.

Rivard began using heroin, officials said, after he could no longer
afford his OxyContin addiction. His OxyContin prescription was from
Menominee physician Louis J. Cannella, 61, who was indicted July 29,
along with 57 other people, in Western Michigan federal court on
charges of illegally prescribing an array of drugs.

Marinette County District Attorney Brent DeBord said Cannella "was
running a Dr. Feelgood operation in the area" by overprescribing
narcotics painkillers to residents, often to teenagers and young
adults such as Rivard.

"Prescription drug abuse in the street has been quite extensive, and
heroin has become quite cheap. We've had a lot of people become
addicted to opiates," DeBord said.

Addicts often turn to heroin when their prescription runs out and
they can't afford to buy the painkillers on the street. They can
typically purchase three or four doses of heroin for the price of one
dose of a prescription painkiller such as OxyContin, he said.

That kind of demand brought heroin dealers up from Milwaukee and
Chicago, DeBord said.

"It's the purest form of capitalism. Drug sellers are very
market-savvy," he said.

As a result, heroin arrests and prosecutions skyrocketed.

"There was a five-month period last year where there was a new
(heroin) bust every weekend" in Marinette County, DeBord said. "At
the end of last year, we had about 14 heroin cases going on at one time."

Dave Spakowicz, a special agent with the state Department of Justice
who heads the federally funded Milwaukee High Intensity Drug
Trafficking Area Heroin Initiative, said Iron Mountain, Mich., also
has "very significant heroin problems linked to prescription drug abuse."

"It's out of Chicago, more than Milwaukee. I-43 -- that is their
pipeline, from Chicago right up to Marinette and the Upper
Peninsula," Spakowicz said.

Spakowicz said the other "rural pocket" where officials have seen
heroin use increase is central Wisconsin.

"We believe the majority of that heroin is coming from Madison," he said.

DeBord said the heroin storm has quieted down in recent months in his
county, thanks in large part to sentences that judges there have been
handing down.

"The judges have been following our recommendations for five years in
prison for heroin possession," he said and "that information is
trickling down" to users and dealers.