HEROIN JUST A CAR RIDE AWAY

Cops Explain Where Porter County People Go For Heroin And How Easy It
Is To Obtain

Need a heroin fix?

Just hop on the expressway and, after fighting the Chicago
construction traffic for an hour and a half, you'll exit and
instantly see plenty of people dressed in bright white tennis shoes.
The shoes signal they're drug dealers.

They ignore the "no loitering" signs and congregate on the stoops of
housing project entrances, or sit on milk crates on street corners
and in alleys. Just hand over $10 and you'll get a bag of heroin that
is good for three or four hits. The dealers make sure their customers
are safe during their brief visits.

That, according to police in Porter County and Chicago, is exactly
what hundreds of Porter County residents do each week.

"Right off the expressway is a good spot for these kids from
Indiana," said Bill Subici, a Cook County police investigator. "It's
the invasion of Indiana plates. You see them all over ... Too much
money and too much time on their hands."

Two hot spots are State Street, between 21st and 27th; and King
Drive, between 31st and 38th. A person can see U.S. Cellular Field,
the home of the Chicago White Sox, from where some dealers stand.

Subici said the dealers start their day early in the morning, when
their clients are on their way to work or school. They continue
working the streets heavily until about 11 p.m., and everything is
pretty much dead by 2 a.m.

He said people ages 12 to 62 deal heroin; many are addicts
themselves. The main dealer divides a large pack of heroin, giving
each dealer 12 to 14 hits of heroin. They spread out, often working
in pairs. One person handles the money, the other the drugs. The
drugs often are hidden under a rock or in the garbage.

Porter County Drug Task Force Coordinator Robert Taylor said his
undercover force has been able to keep drug dealers off Porter
County's street corners. That's why the estimated 1,000 heroin users
in Porter County head west.

"Most of (the heroin) is coming out of Chicago. Some of it's coming
out of Chicago Heights, Ford Heights and Gary," Taylor said.

Taylor isn't aware of any major heroin dealers in Porter County. Most
dealing that goes on here involves one user going to Chicago for
enough drugs for himself and his circle of friends, Taylor said.

Taylor said his three undercover officers have had trouble
infiltrating these small groups of heroin users since they mostly use
with and deal to one another.

Still, he's pleased undercover officers have been able to keep a lid
on most dealing here.

Taylor said he used to go to Chicago to watch for Porter County
license plates, then work with Chicago police to arrest the Porter
County drug users. But the police departments that contribute
manpower to Porter County's drug unit had concerns about the safety
of such operations and about how Porter County's cops don't have
police powers in Chicago. So now it's up to police in the Chicago
area and Gary to stop the dealing that goes on there.

Alex Rodriguez, a retired Drug Enforcement Administration agent who
now is an Ogden Dunes police officer, said most of the heroin being
dealt in this region originates in Colombia and is distributed by
Mexicans. Some of the Chicago gangs, however, get their stuff from
southeast Asia.

Chicago, like New York, is a hub for drug distribution, Rodriguez said.

Subici said the war on drugs has been lost, but police do what they
can to combat drug dealing.

The problem, he said, is that young people keep trying these highly
addictive drugs. All the anti-drug messages are no match for what
happens when young people are at a party and are offered drugs.

The dealers -- faced with working at McDonald's for $5.50 an hour or
making $300 a day dealing drugs -- keep dealing.

And police are bogged down by paperwork and lack of manpower.

"There's not enough people to stop it. The funds are just not there,"
Subici said.

Rodriguez said the heroin he came across when he started with the DEA
in 1976 was only 3 percent pure. Now, it's at least 50 percent pure,
perhaps explaining why so many people have died of heroin overdoses
in recent years.

What hasn't changed over the past 30 years is the price, Rodriguez said.

For $10, someone can buy a bag of heroin that is good for three or four hits.

"It's cheap, and they have good heroin sources," Rodriguez said.

Regionally, the heroin problem has been unique to Porter County, but
that is changing, Taylor said. He said Lake and LaPorte counties,
which long have had crack cocaine problems, are starting to see heroin as well.