Drug Addicts

O nly in hindsight did it strike anyone as odd: Carrie John never seemed to invite friends and neighbors into her Ridgely's Delight rowhouse. Instead, she would meet friends out, or people would watch from the corner to make sure she got in after a night at the bar. "None of us ever went inside," said a friend, Julie Della-Maria. The reason might have been the "huge gardens" of marijuana and assorted pills that police found on the day John, a 29-year-old drug abuse researcher, died after injecting what she thought was a narcotic.

Only in hindsight did it strike anyone as odd: Carrie John never seemed to invite friends and neighbors into her Ridgely's Delight rowhouse. Instead, she would meet friends out, or people would watch from the corner to make sure she got in after a night at the bar. "None of us ever went inside," said a friend, Julie Della-Maria. The reason might have been the "huge gardens" of marijuana and assorted pills that police found on the day John, a 29-year-old drug abuse researcher, died after injecting what she thought was a narcotic.

They had him cold. A secret camera caught the pharmacist helping himself to drugs off the shelves and downing them on the job. He was taken away in handcuffs and arrested, but on the second day of his trial, he got off with a light prison sentence, probation and regular drug testing. It barely broke his stride, and he soon landed another job in another pharmacy. Prison? The judge let him serve his term on weekends. Drug testing? "I put my knowledge of pharmacology to good use," Jared Combs says.

About 100 recovering drug addicts marched on City Hall yesterday to protest public funding cuts that will cripple a well-known recovery program. Chanting the name of the organization, I Can't We Can, they drew the attention of City Councilman Bernard "Jack" Young, who said he is powerless to help but "stands in solidarity." Other city employees stopped to watch the group pray and tell stories about addiction and survival. Al Moy?, who credits the program with his recovery from addiction, said lives and public safety are at risk if I Can't We Can closes its doors.

Beyond the iron gate, the fence and the razor wire, 10 inmates in maroon uniforms sit in stillness, listening to the serene sounds of sitar music. Eyes closed, hands folded, they await the tiny pricks of acupuncture needles being inserted delicately in their ears. Ancient Chinese medicine came to Baltimore's jail 16 years ago with the promise of curbing the cravings of drug addiction. Since then, acupuncture has been the centerpiece of a treatment program that serves nearly 700 inmates each year.

A new study done for Baltimore's Abell Foundation concludes that programs that give heroin to hard-core addicts can reduce crime and improve public health - findings some hope will spur renewed debate about whether such an effort could help combat the city's unrelenting drug problem. Peter Reuter, a drug policy expert at the University of Maryland, College Park, analyzed heroin maintenance programs in Switzerland, the Netherlands, Germany and Vancouver, Canada. He found some positive results.

Christopher Nieto believes in Baltimore. His car has been broken into four times. They took his iPod, his Discman and the empty plastic suction cup that held his navigational device. They even stripped the rubber off his wiper blades. His former house in Pigtown was burglarized three times. They took two television sets, his suits, watches and two laptop computers. "I have absolutely nothing left of value anymore," he says. "I'm down to a pretty skeletal home life." Christopher Nieto also believes in his job. He is a public defender.

Nicole Sesker probably didn't die from a heroin overdose, but drugs took her life nonetheless. Her suspected murder received more than the usual attention not because of Baltimore's stubborn homicide rate, but because she was a former city police commissioner's stepdaughter who couldn't escape her addiction. In that regard, Ms. Sesker was like many other city residents - they've become hostages to their drug of choice and the illicit trafficking fueling so much of Baltimore's crime. Drug addiction remains a pervasive problem in Baltimore, and while millions in public dollars are spent annually on treatment for its most disadvantaged victims (about 23,000)

A Southwest Baltimore man who wrote notes, made threats and tried to arrange the poisoning of witnesses who were to testify at his murder trial pleaded guilty yesterday to murder and witness-intimidation charges and was sentenced to nine years in prison. Baltimore Circuit Judge Charles G. Bernstein acknowledged that Ray "Lucky" Williams' 30-year sentence, with all but nine years suspended, is "very, very lenient." Williams' previous trial ended with a hung jury, and the case against him was rife with difficulties common in Baltimore murder cases.

When friends recalled Marshall Shure yesterday, they compared him to Matlock, a folksy, down-home attorney who could lull people into thinking he was their friend while he was tearing their testimony apart. He could equally play the part of father confessor and social worker. Mr. Shure, an assistant state's attorney who prosecuted vagrancy, car theft, spouse beating and drug possession cases in Baltimore's neighborhood courts - mostly in the Southern District - died of lung cancer Wednesday at the Levindale Hebrew Center and Hospital.