Dead At 19

WATCHFUL MOTHER COULDN'T SAVE SON

LONG BEACH - One week before 19-year-old Derek Johnson died of a drug
overdose in August, his mother, Angie Johnson, noticed that her eldest son
was acting differently.

Derek Johnson's moods changed in a matter of weeks. He had a new group of
friends but was depressed and cried to his grandparents after attending a
church service five days before his death. The sermon that day focused on
the effects of drugs in one's life and how they could affect "where you
wanted to be in your life."

After the service, Derek sobbed before telling his grandfather, "I think
there is something wrong with my head."

Angie Johnson knew something was wrong with her son and sat him down to
talk about drug use. It wasn't the first time she'd talked to him about the
dangers of drugs. When he was younger, she'd searched his room and found
marijuana.

Police also had caught him and some friends with a marijuana joint in their
car.

During her last talk with Derek, he told her he'd quit smoking marijuana
and "kicked" anything else he was doing. He also told his mother there
wasn't a place you could go in his hometown and not find drugs.

" 'It's like buying a coke,' " his mother said Derek told her.

He also admitted he'd taken an anti-anxiety drug before, but he never
mentioned Methadone, the drug that killed him. Methadone is usually given
to heroin addicts to help curb their addiction. Lortab, a prescription
painkiller, also was found in Derek's system.

Johnson didn't stop watching her son's behavior even after their talk. She
took him to a doctor to have a physical that included a drug screen and he
came out clean.

Doctors then prescribed an anti-depressant. Derek only took the medication
for a week.

Angie Johnson expected to see improvement in her son, who was an avid
hunter and loved playing basketball and working on cars. The 2002 graduate
of Long Beach High was scheduled to start a new semester at Mississippi
Gulf Coast Community College's Jefferson Davis campus three days after his
death.

The last time his family saw him alive was when he ate dinner at his
grandparents. He then headed out for the night with friends. Derek called
his mother about 10:30 p.m. and said he was on his way home. He never made it.

Somewhere along the way, Derek got sidetracked. A longtime friend picked
him up and took him to his house because it was late.

Angie Johnson had fallen asleep and awoke the next morning only to find
that Derek was still not home. She started calling his cell phone over and
over again, even after she'd arrived at her job at Memorial Hospital in
Gulfport.

A short time later, she learned that paramedics were en route to the
hospital with a young man who had overdosed. His name was Derek Johnson.
Not long after that, Angie Johnson found herself sitting in a room with
family and friends and hearing the news that would change her life forever.
Derek was dead.

"He looked like an angel," Johnson said. "There wasn't anything visibly
wrong with him."

Johnson found out after her son's death that others knew he'd started
experimenting with the drugs.

"What's sad is that kids know which kids are doing drugs," Johnson said.
"Kids now are saying, 'We should have told you,' or they saw him taking
Ecstasy in the two weeks before he died. Why didn't they tell me then?
Apparently, there were even some parents who knew. They need to speak up.
It might ruin some friendships but it could save a life."

Johnson plans to speak to teens about the effects of drugs during Red
Ribbon Week this week.

She's also hoping to persuade lawmakers to pass a law that would require
law enforcement officials to keep track of where the Schedule II narcotics,
such as Methadone, are coming from.

To this day, she has no idea where Derek got the Methadone that killed him.

"It's illegal to even write a prescription for Methadone in Mississippi,
but you can get it filled here," she said. "That shouldn't be happening. My
son is dead."

Two black paint marks etched on Angie Johnson's driveway are a reminder of
the son she's lost.

He loved working on cars, tinting windows for neighbors and experimenting
with paints for his own car. The day of his death, he was supposed to drop
his car off at a body shop to get it fixed up.

"He was looking forward to that," Angie Johnson said. "He never made it."