Series: Wasted Youth (Day 3 -- 2 Of 3)

NEITHER NICK PRATT NOR HIS FAMILY COULD PREVENT THE END THEY FEARED

Nick Pratt Knew He Was In Trouble, But Neither He Nor His Family
Could Find The Help They Needed

They could see the sickness in Nick Pratt's smile.

The once-photogenic teenager had black holes in his teeth.

From heroin.

It eats through the enamel," said Nick's father, Ted. "This is
heroin. It's amazing what it does. It eats your brain and your liver
just like alcohol. It ate his teeth."

Nick felt ashamed, hated what he had become, and hated his dependence
on a drug he didn't know existed two years earlier.

But he couldn't stop, and couldn't get the help he needed in time --
he died at his Brockton home from an overdose Sept. 13, 2005.

He was 20 -- he looked 15.

At least before heroin.

Nicholas was very particular about how he looked," said his mother,
Krista, "even with his buddies. He was horrified as to what had
happened to him, because of this addiction."

He tried the painkiller OxyContin at a party. His family isn't sure
when he started heroin, but watched in 2004 as the boyish and buoyant
teen withered before their eyes.

Suddenly, the hair wasn't as clean, he began nodding off on the
couch, he developed pneumonia, and his teeth darkened.

Within three months of him using, we could tell," said Nick's sister,
Shauna. "We confronted him. The five of us sat down with him, and he
went into detox that night. He was embarrassed, but we all wanted him
to get better."

Nick, his family alongside, fought the addiction for months. But when
he needed -- and wanted -- more treatment, he couldn't find it.

In 2004, he spent two 10-day sessions at a rehab hospital. They
didn't work, so his family had him "sectioned" -- or arrested and
then committed by a judge to Bridgewater State Hospital for 30 days.

The teenager who liked playing with model cars, tinkering with tools,
and acting like a high school student was suddenly bunking with
seasoned criminals.

To watch your son get handcuffed for a sickness ..." said Ted Pratt.
He was mad. He turned to me and said, 'Why are you doing this to me.'
I told him, but he knew. It was the only way we could keep him alive."

It seemed to work. Nick, always slight at 5-feet-5, put on 20 pounds.
He regained his robustness, rediscovered his optimism, sharpened his smile.

And the black spots faded.

He was thinking normally, and thinking about getting on with his
life," said his sister. Nick returned to construction work with his
father, helped his mother, a nurse, around the house, and reconnected
with his aunt, Jody Price.

He loved cars," said Price, "so we found him this remote-control car
that you put together. One day he kneels down on a bed next to me and
pulls out this car. His hat was crooked, and he said, 'Shauna bought
this for me because I've been so good. ...' He talked like that, like
a little kid, even though he was 20."

With the help of his family, he fought back the addiction for several
months in early 2005.

But several events drew him back, including the death of a close
friend -- Shannah Duggan, 19, who died at her Taunton home in June 2005.

His family watched as he slid back into heroin use by summer's end.

He knew he was out of control and he knew we were getting ready to
section him again," said his father, "but he wanted the help. He really did."

Ted and Krista Pratt spent the weekend trying to save their son. They
called nine area rehab centers, even places in New Hampshire. The
response was the same.

The guy would say, 'We have no beds. Call in an hour.'" said Krista
Pratt. "I called every 15 minutes. There weren't any beds. Now I know
go and pound on doors until somebody takes your kid in. Don't stop.
Keep going until someone listens."

The Pratts, desperate, contacted the Brockton Police for help --
their son would have to be "sectioned" again.

The pickup was set for Tuesday. It would be too late.

Nick, in his room, injected his final dose late that night. His
father found him, unconscious, when he checked in at 1:30 a.m. Sept.
13. Krista performed CPR, and paramedics were able to find a faint
pulse, but the dose had proven lethal.

Police arrived Tuesday morning, as expected, but not to arrest the
young man who never grew up -- or had the chance to.

Instead, they covered him, and took the boy's body away.

[Accompanying article on website]

Todd Gilmore Pays Ultimate Price After He Can't Elude Heroin's Grasp

By Maureen Boyle, Enterprise Staff Writer

Todd Gilmore died on St. Patrick's Day, near the railroad tracks off
Oak Street in Taunton.
It took two days before his body was found.

One of his brothers spent hours at a nearby laundry on one of those
days, washing and drying clothes, as Gilmore's family waited at home,
wondering if Todd was safe - and hoping that the knock from police
would not come.

Todd Gilmore was 33 when he was found dead on March 19, 2006. He left
behind a son, three brothers and his mother. He had grown up in
Raynham, later moved to Taunton with his family and worked for a
moving company.

"As much as I expected it, when it happened, it still blows you
away," Judy Gilmore, his mother, said.

When Todd was 21/2, he cried when he watched a man inside a
carnival dunk tank on a hot July day.

"He doesn't have a towel," he told his mother. "He'll get cold."

Todd, his family said, was a sensitive child who grew up to be an
anxious and worried young man, turning first to alcohol then to
heroin to quell the angst in his heart.

He would shoplift, then sell the goods to pay for what grew to be a
heroin habit costing hundreds of dollars a day - it landed him
repeatedly in jail.

In jail, he would get clean, reveling in the structure behind bars.
He went to a prison boot camp in Bridgewater and earned accolades for
his work and behavior. "He was valedictorian of his class," his mother said.

He would send letters home to his mother. "I know there is one
person I can count on in this world, and it is a good feeling to have
a mother like you," he wrote.

"I love you," he wrote in another.

Each time he got out of jail, Todd would struggle to stay clean. He
lived with his brother in Rochester one winter after getting out,
trying to stay away from the city streets and the temptation of
drugs. His brother hoped it would be the step that would turn Todd's
life around.

But the draw of the drug was too strong.

Todd borrowed his nephew's bike and rode to Taunton to buy drugs,
then returned to greet the boy when the school bus pulled to the
house in the afternoon.

Each time he sought help, his brothers and mother would take turns
watching him around the clock, each calling in sick to work, until a
treatment bed would be available.

And when he was released, either from detox or jail, his family
braced for the eventual relapse.

"I would yell at him, 'You're going to die. I don't want to bury
you,'" his mother said.

But the lure of heroin was too strong.

"He found his true love in heroin," his brother, Gary, said. "What
heroin was to Todd was a wife, a husband, a spouse, a good book, a
glass of wine, a good friend."

The knock on the door of Judy Gilmore's Taunton home came last year.

A state trooper and Taunton detective broke the news to her: Todd
was dead of an apparent drug overdose.

"The hope," Judy Gilmore said, "is gone."