FORMER DRUG ADDICT OPENS TEENS' EYES

Fifteen-year-old Ben Potipcoe knows a number of teenagers who have tried
marijuana. He figures many teens smoke it at least once.

But if his peers begin to experiment with harder drugs, like ecstasy and
LSD, or acid, Potipcoe plans to walk away.

He has a former drug dealer and addict to thank for that.

"He opened my eyes," Potipcoe said of 27-year-old Julian Madigan, who spoke
at St. Benedict Catholic Secondary School in Cambridge Tuesday on the
dangers of drug use.

"You hear of things but you don't comprehend it until you really think
about it."

Madigan forced about 1,600 students at the Cambridge high school to think
harder about drug use Tuesday.

He told the crowd how, at 13 while living in Ireland, he smoked his first
cigarette and sipped his first beer. Then he tried marijuana. Shortly
after, he started going to raves where he began popping acid. Then came
ecstasy.

He became so addicted to the high from these drugs that he began trading
his own clothes for pills. Then he started stealing from his family. When
that wasn't enough, Madigan began selling drugs to pay for his own supply.

Within a year, his grades slipped, he was kicked off his swim team, watched
his track career slow to a halt and, perhaps worst of all, Madigan made his
grandmother cry.

"She would be crying and wondering where I was," said Madigan, referring to
the weekends he wouldn't come home.

"How do the events of the weekend make you neglect the most important
things in your life? Do drugs and you'll know why."

After four years, Madigan was finally able to ask for help after police
busted his home looking for drugs, and a dealer threatened his life over a
$1,500 drug debt.