DRUGS' DEADLY REALITY

John Ed Pearce wrote in his June 27 column that as long as there are
drug buyers there will be sellers and that the war on drugs isn't working.

He also said Estill, Lee and Owsley counties' Circuit Judge William
Trude Jr. has a common-sense approach to the drug problem: that it
costs a lot of money to prosecute and convict drug users who deal to
support their habits.

Pearce doesn't mention the cost of letting dealers off with a slap on
the wrist so they can get right back to business as usual. That cost
includes lives lost; in Estill County we average two drug-related
deaths a month.

Drugs have affected the lives of nearly every person in this county,
and dealers should be jailed. I agree that we need to get the addicts
into rehabilitation, but to eliminate the problem we have to get drugs
off the street.

Pearce should come to Estill County and talk to anybody he meets on
the street. He will learn what it is like to live in a drug-infested
community where the judiciary doesn't support law enforcement. Our
police officers are trying to clean up the county, but every time they
bust a dealer, the judge puts him back on the street.

Rhonda Smyth

Irvine