In late January 2015, I found myself writing my little brother’s obituary. At 26 years old, he had died of a heroin overdose.
For most of his life, Ryan battled addiction. Eventually we learned to talk openly about his struggle. I used to tell him that as long as he used, he would follow one of two paths — he would end up in jail or dead. In actuality, he did both. For the last nine years of his life, Ryan was in and out of jail on drug-related charges.
I made the call that put him there one of those times. In December 2013, I returned to my home in Portland to discover Ryan using once again. I was furious and scared. He had told me he was done using, and I wanted so badly to believe him. I thought that calling the cops would get him the help I couldn’t give him. I was wrong.
Each time Ryan went to jail it became harder for him to continue his education, keep a job and maintain the support of people who loved him. From my perspective now, jail time actually pushed Ryan farther away from from the things that helped him stay sober.
Many people believe, like I did then, that people battling addiction can get the help they need in jail. Society has treated addiction like a criminal justice problem for so long that I believed the courts and time behind bars “set people straight.” In reality, addiction is an illness. And like other sick people, Ryan desperately needed effective medical and mental health treatment that was scarcely available.
Medication-assisted treatment, which medical experts agree is the most effective form of opiate addiction treatment, is not available in Maine’s jails and prisons. Access to counseling for mental health issues, which I believe started Ryan on the path of using, also is rare. And even if they do receive counseling in jail, most addicts do not have access to transitional support programs after release.
Without access to effective treatment options, most people leaving jail with drug addiction will likely use again — as Cumberland County Sheriff Kevin Joyce told the legislature earlier this year. It’s not the fault of law enforcement, which is doing the best it can with limited resources. But the fact is that since jails are not hospitals, they are not the right place to help sick people.
That’s why I disagree with arguments that the best answer to Maine’s heroin problem is to ramp up penalties for drug possession. Right now, there is a bill before the Legislature, LD 1554, to do just that.
Until last year, the penalty in Maine for individuals caught for the first time with small amounts of many drugs, including heroin, was a felony charge. These first-time offenders faced up to five years behind bars as well as a host of collateral consequences, such as barriers to housing, employment and education loans.
Understanding that a new approach to the drug problem was needed, the Legislature voted last year to reduce some first-time possession charges from a felony to a misdemeanor, which still carries up to 364 days in jail and the possibility of probation, mandated drug counseling and random drug testing.
This was a big step forward for Maine — recognition that we could no longer arrest our way out of the drug problem. But now, before the new law has even had time to make a difference, the Legislature is considering a bill that would re-felonize first-time possession of heroin and other drugs.
Proponents of this bill say harsh criminal penalties will get these individuals the help they need. But that didn’t work for the last several years, when heroin possession was a felony and use and overdose deaths kept rising. It certainly didn’t work for my brother.
Too many families are finding themselves writing obituaries thanks to overdose. It’s too late to get my brother the help he needed, but it’s not too late to save hundreds of other lives — lives of siblings and parents, friends and neighbors. Lives of other Mainers. They, like Ryan, won’t get better in jail. I urge the legislature to reject LD 1554 and instead focus on diversion and treatment programs that will actually solve the problem.
Andrew Bossie grew up in Caribou, Maine. He now lives in Portland.