COCAINE KILLED INMATE

Superjail Death Probed In Midland Court

Joseph Balog never knew the cocaine he was snorting was silently
destroying his heart, keeping him teetering on the brink of death.

That is the tragedy a coroner's jury tried to address Wednesday when
it recommended the provincial government create programs for school
children to teach them the deadly drug can cause a user to suddenly
drop dead of heart failure.

The recommendation follows a three-day inquest exploring the death of
Balog, a 20-year-old inmate at the Central North Correctional Centre
in Penetanguishene, referred to as the superjail.

The jury found that Balog died accidentally Sept. 29, 2003, from
cardiac arrest due to toxic levels of cocaine in his system.

Experts testified Balog's heart, liver and spleen were so swollen and
filled with scar tissue from constant cocaine abuse that he was bound
to die, although he was unaware of his condition.

"His cocaine abuse had so beat up his heart that his death was going
to happen no matter what," said Crown attorney Davie Russell, counsel
for the coroner.

During the inquest, Russell traced Balog's last two days before the
man collapsed in convulsions in his cell at the superjail.

"His death was the result of a bad decision to choose cocaine to deal
with difficulties in his life in what he probably perceived as a
pretty negative world.

"For him, cocaine was the easy way. But, once he was addicted, it
became his only way."

In a tearful plea to the jury, Balog's mother asked them to recommend
programs to kids while they are young, before it's too late.

"Tough love sometimes doesn't work," said Kinga Balog.

"Education is the key."

Earlier this week, the jury heard of the mother's frantic attempts to
save her son from his addiction to cocaine and codeine-based
prescription drugs.

She begged him to go into treatment.

She went to the police to ask what could be done.

And, finally, the day before he died, in one last desperate attempt at
tough love, she moved out of her Barrie house and told her son he
could not move with her unless he first signed himself into a detox
centre.

In a frenzied state, her son called her from the emptied house and
told her he shot himself.

She called 911.

Barrie police surrounded the house and eventually talked Balog into
surrendering.

It turned out his suicide threat was just a ploy to get his mother's
attention, but police did find two firearms, ammunition, cocaine and
hundreds of pills of every colour in his room.

His mother described the surge of relief she felt when she learned
police would take him to Barrie's Royal Victoria Hospital after
arresting him under the Mental Health Act.

"I thought he was finally going to get the help that he needed," she
said.

But, after a 15-minute assessment by a doctor at the hospital, he was
released to police, who took him back into custody and charged him
with drug and weapons offences.

Balog spent his last night on a concrete slab at the Barrie police
station.

The next day, after he was transported to the superjail, he collapsed
in convulsions and was pronounced dead of cardiac arrest at Huronia
District Hospital in Midland.

No one knows for sure when he took his last hit of cocaine or codeine,
but it could have been before he was arrested, the inquest heard.

Inmates who were chained to Balog during the trip to the superjail
said he was sweating and "coming down" off prescription drugs and he
wanted more.

In his report on the cause of death, pathologist Russell Price noted
Balog's heart was enlarged.

He said Balog would not have known about his condition.

"If young people were more aware of the damage that cocaine causes, do
you think they would use it a lot less?" one juror asked the doctor.

"I would hope that would be the case," he answered.

"Cocaine's capacity to cause death is relatively misunderstood, even
by medical doctors -- let alone young people."