THEY WANT YOUR KIDS TO KNOW

Crouching figures scatter from dark doorways as the brown, unmarked police
car turns up the Hastings Street back alley.

One ragged woman, dressed in a black see-through, full-length slip over her
white short pants, is squatting by a makeshift table made from an
over-turned box. Boiled corn and leftover bread are her meal.

Instead of bolting, she greets the two police officers, hanging her head in
the driver's window, asking for cigarettes.

"Hey, Nicky, real farmer's market today, huh?" says Const. Toby Hinton. His
partner, Const. Al Arsenault, steps out of the car, not to arrest or roust
her, but with a broadcast-quality video camera to film her.

So the stage is set for another shift of the Odd Squad, a group of seven
Vancouver policemen who have spent the last 16 months documenting the lives
of six downtown east-side drug addicts.

Their intention is to use their film, Through a Blue Lens, as an educational
tool to help prevent drug use among the young and to inform "civilians"
about the ravages of drug use in the area, the drug-shooting capital of
Canada.

But Nicky is too edgy for Hollywood North just now; she needs a fix and runs
off, a few doors down the lane, to inject herself with cocaine.

The two officers leave her alone. They have long since learned that
arresting every drug user in the area is not the answer to the infestation
in these back lanes and blighted streets.

Minutes later, she's back, crouching again in the urine-stinking doorway,
now swinging a small hand mirror in a circle on a long piece of knitted
rope.

Asked what she's doing, she has an answer of sorts: "There is a negative
image in here right now, right?" Nicky says in a cultured accent hinting of
her native England.

"When you swing this, it actually shakes. I believe there is some sort of
being that attacks the glass, and it makes it dizzy, and then it makes
mistakes."

Nicky, 42, a drug addict since she was injected at 15 years of age by a
39-year-old man, comes from a well-off local family. Her mother and sisters
still drive through these loathsome streets, reportedly the poorest and most
dangerous in Canada, to find her, to try to help her.

The family has paid for Nicky to take the cure many times, but she always
comes back, to live outdoors, feeling it is somehow safer than the rooming
houses.

A bright, articulate woman when straight, she protects herself while on
drugs with these bizarre rituals, hoping to keep evil forces away.

Asked why she has allowed the Odd Squad to detail her life in such detail,
she does not hesitate: "If one child can be made to think twice before they
start drugs, then I believe it's worthwhile."

Nicky, who once dreamed of becoming an antiques dealer, says she's mostly
off heroin and is using methadone. She'd love to get her missing front teeth
fixed, get cleaned up in time for her little sister's wedding, maybe get a
nice new dress, clean underwear.

But she can't stop injecting cocaine.

"It's a psychological addiction with cocaine. When you are psychologically
addicted to it, you are ruled," she says, almost spitting the words.

"Your life revolves around the acquisition and use of drugs. The four states
are euphoria, paranoia, psychosis and then death."

As Nicky pushes a small cart loaded with clothes -- and, incongruously, a
bouquet of fresh pink roses -- down the lane, Arsenault and Hinton have to
break off -- the emergency beep is blaring over the police radio.

A man has been stabbed at the corner of Hastings and Main, a block away, and
the two Odd Squad members need footage of street violence to complete their
documentary.

A man has been slashed across the forehead with a butcher knife; blood
covers his face and torso and has splashed over his lizard-skin cowboy
boots.

Arsenault points the $10,000 camera as the ambulance attendants bandage the
man's head and load him on board.

The footage will be shown to Veronica Mannix, a documentary film-maker whose
20-minute trailer of the squad's videos persuaded the National Film Board to
back the venture.

Through the Blue Lens, a 52-minute movie culled from 86 hours of gritty
footage, is scheduled to be finished in about four weeks and will likely be
shown on television in the fall. The NFB is also helping to produce videos
for schools.

The project started almost by accident.

Arsenault, a photography buff who for years carried a still camera while on
duty, showed some of his slides of his three "tours of duty" of the downtown
east side at a beat party for policemen who had worked in the area.

Hinton started using the slides in classroom anti-drug presentations and,
finally, Mannix became involved. She persuaded them to shoot videotape.

In March 1998, seven officers, Mark Steinkampf, Dave Kolb, Len
Hollingsworth, Dale Weidman, Walter McKay, Hinton and Arsenault, formed the
non-profit Odd Squad Productions Society, and each chipped in $400 to pay
for a camera.

Their goal is loosely "to educate the public on issues affecting the
community," said Hinton.

That camera has since been upgraded and all their subjects have signed
releases allowing their lives to be exposed. The squad started with 14
addicts, but zeroed in on the six.

Now a tightly knit group within the 1,149-member Vancouver police force, the
seven dubbed themselves the Odd Squad for the pedestrian reason that they
worked the shifts starting with odd numbers. And they admit that filming
addicts is an odd way to police.

The filming was done while both on and off duty. The camera came out when
something interesting happened during their shifts, or the crew would
intentionally track down their subjects.

Hinton figures the group has worked 16-hour days for months, including
giving over 100 public presentations.

Why would they bother?

"We were tired of seeing kids come down here fresh, and six months later
they looked like crap and they were out hooking," said Arsenault, a 20-year
veteran.

"It's a novel approach to the problem we have -- kids getting hooked on
drugs."

Producer Mannix said she's been impressed with the interaction between the
police and the street people. Her husband, Daniel, also shot film for the
documentary.

"They have an extraordinary human approach, incredible access," she said of
the squad. "In most cases the addicts were happy to see them. They know it
stops the place from going completely crazy."

The project has changed the way the cops see their jobs and the people they
deal with in the area.

Steinkampf, an eight-year veteran, was used to hard-line policing when he
first hit the skids.

He has softened, especially after looking through family photo albums with
the addicts he once arrested.

"When I first came down here, everybody went to jail, no matter what," he
said. "This project has given a face to everybody. You realize they are all
people who had families, who still have families."

Arsenault agreed: "I've learned a good deal of compassion for these people,"
he said. "Most had some form of decent life before ending up in the toilet
bowl of society. I've met ex-millionaires, businessmen, housewives and
school kids of all nationalities and socio-economic backgrounds."

The officers know their film will not save the people already here, but at
least two of their subjects are doing well. One man, once one of the skids'
worst addicts and thought to be near death, has made a remarkable recovery.

"They developed a sense of self-]esteem and a sense of worth," said
Arsenault.

"They have nothing to give to society monetarily. All they have is their
pathetic story about their drug use. They say if they can save one other
person from coming down here, it's worth it."

Nicky says this:

"It's misery. It's torment. It's death. It's overdosing. It's sickness and
disease."