EVEN BLINDING COULDN'T BREAK METH ADDICTION

It Took A Prison Term To End Old Patterns And Turn Downstate Man Into
An Anti-Drug Crusader

PEORIA - Matthew Yeater had made meth hundreds of times. But seconds
after the 20-year-old grabbed a Thermos of stolen anhydrous ammonia--a
key ingredient--it exploded in his face.

Yeater inhaled a lungful of the toxic gas, and the vapors began eating
away at his eyes. "I [thought], oh my God, I'm going to be blind if I
don't die," said the former resident of Pleasant Hill, Ill.

Yeater, 23, was right. The accident burned his corneas and left him
blind, but that didn't force him to quit using the drug. That didn't
happen until nearly a year later, when he was sentenced to 6 years in
prison for intent to manufacture methamphetamine.

Now, 2 years into his sentence, Yeater is trying to educate others
about the dangers of meth. About three times a week, he is escorted
from the Adult Transitional Center, a work-release program in Peoria,
to schools across the state, where he talks to teens about the
pitfalls of drug use.

With meth's growing popularity among youths in rural communities,
Yeater is almost glad he was caught. Prison forced him to enter
treatment and stay away from the friends who had helped perpetuate his
destructive behavior.

"I've done a lot of crap," said Yeater, his jaw twitching slightly, a
residual effect of his addiction. "I was tired of running, I was tired
of cheating, and I was hoping that [authorities] would do something."

Yeater's straightforward approach and self-deprecating wit have become
popular with students.

"The response that we're getting back from the kids ... it's just
phenomenal the way they are receiving it," said Carlos Terry,
assistant director of the Peoria program.

With his stocky, muscular frame and closely cropped blond hair, Yeater
looks more like an escaped boy-band member than a drug dealer who has
produced and sold meth in Missouri, Arkansas and Illinois.

But the drug was just the latest in a long line of addictive
substances that Yeater sampled.

At age 6, he got drunk from a mixture of beer and vodka. By 12,
Yeater, the son of an alcoholic mother, was smoking marijuana
regularly. By the time he had dropped out of Quincy High School at 16,
Yeater had dabbled with meth, his new favorite drug.

"When they're shooting it like Matt did, they know what it's doing to
them, but by then it's got them," said Jim Fagan, Yeater's drug counselor.

Fagan said he was not surprised that Yeater continued using meth after
the accident.

"Consequences don't mean anything. [Meth users] have an overwhelming
compulsion," he said.

Yeater is determined not to let the drug rob him of his future. He has
earned a GED, has learned to read Braille and plans to start studies
at Illinois Central College. He hopes to become a drug counselor.

"It's not easy out there, and nothing's going to change unless we
change it," Yeater said.