NAPERVILLE COPS WARN OF TEEN HEROIN USE

It's an all-too-common sight at some street corners in the troubled
Austin neighborhood on Chicago's West Side: gang bangers pushing
heroin to anyone with money.

And that includes a number of Naperville teenagers, according to
police in the far western suburb.

Law enforcement officials say they are mobilizing to head off what
they fear is a new and growing drug problem among Naperville's youth
before it approaches greater proportions or the city loses its first
high schooler to a heroin overdose.

And as part of that effort, Naperville police started a new campaign
to educate the public Wednesday night, holding a meeting at Naperville
North High School that warned of the growing dangers of heroin and
other drugs in the city.

Police Sgt. Lisa Burghardt said the department has identified about 30
heroin users at various stages of addiction or recovery at Naperville
North and Central High Schools, but investigators believe the real
number of those battling the brutally addictive drug may be twice that
figure.

"Even four years ago, it wasn't a problem here," Burghardt said. "But
incrementally, now we've seen more kids get involved--kids as young as
14 and 15. And they are hanging out in neighborhoods that I don't let
my officers go into without the Chicago police with them."

There are no clear reasons that youngsters in one of DuPage County's
premier suburbs drift toward heroin, but Burghardt noted that
Naperville teenagers tend to have more disposable cash than others
their age. She also said a new snortable type of heroin is available
on the streets of Chicago that has erased images of cooking the drug
in dirty bottle caps and injecting it with a needle.

Police predict that reports that the potent narcotic may be gaining a
foothold in Naperville will stun some city residents--and officers
said they hope so.

Bruce Cameron, Naperville North principal, said district
administrators learned of the burgeoning problem about three weeks ago
and immediately alerted parents through networking. They then
organized Wednesday's meeting.

He said school staffs have been warned of the signs of heroin use and
the school has started using small groups and other means to let
youngsters know about the hazards of heroin.

Burghardt and others city officials are urging all parents of the two
schools' combined student population of more than 5,000 to sit down
with their teenagers and warn them that heroin use could rob them of
their future.

At Wednesday night's meeting, Officer Gregg Bell and Robin Amberger,
the school's student assistance program coordinator, told
approximately 60 people in attendance about how abuse of the drug has
changed.

Burghardt said the typical Naperville teenager who becomes involved
with heroin is a youngster from a good family who lacks nothing
financially.

The Naperville scenario is similar to that which has developed in
other, better-documented cases, she said, such as the much-publicized
heroin crisis in Plano, Texas, an affluent Dallas suburb. That
community's loss of several young people to heroin overdoses received
national attention last year.

But many suburban police departments are quick to downplay the
Naperville situation, saying it may be an isolated problem. They say
they haven't seen any usual increases in the number of young heroin
users. In fact, some said they haven't had any heroin-related arrests
in recent memory.

"We don't find a whole lot of heroin use," said Dave Okon, crime
prevention officer with the Mt. Prospect Police Department. "It's not
a viable opportunity for them."

"It defies the odds that Naperville would be having the kind of
epidemic that they're seeing," Okon added.

Police Sgt. Ray McGury, a member of the Naperville department's
special enforcement unit, is among the officers charged with trying to
block the flow of the narcotic into Naperville.

He said the practice of teenagers heading into Chicago neighborhoods
to buy drugs on streets where violence is commonplace is especially
worrisome. Police said they fear some of the youths won't be around
long enough to get help for their addiction.

"Informants have told us some of them have been robbed multiple times
by street dealers down there, and one was beaten up," said McGury. "My
worst nightmare is that one of our kids will get killed there."

McGury said the fact that teenagers are buying the drug, and in many
cases using it, outside the Naperville limits makes it hard to combat.
He said police believe most youths only buy enough for one or two uses.

Officers in many cases don't discover a teenager has a problem until
their addiction spirals out of control and they begin to commit thefts
to support their growing habit, McGury said.

Chicago police have been cooperative in sharing information when they
stop a car in Austin that is registered in Naperville, McGury said,
but enforcement remains difficult. McGury said his officers have made
no arrests of young people in Naperville for heroin possession, but
police said that's due in part to a lack of a local source of the drug.

Bell and Burghardt said police will continue to steer addicted
teenagers to counseling and concentrate on prevention efforts, hoping
to build off Wednesday's gathering at Naperville North.