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Major Cities in Missouri with Drug Rehab and Treatment Centers:
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866-407-4380
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Drug Rehab Missouri
is here to help people with drug and/or alcohol abuse problems in Missouri. find treatment options. Due to our diverse networking system we can find a treatment option tailored to each individuals specific situation and needs. We are able to provide all phases of recovery included but not limited to, alcohol and/or drug intervention, drug and/or alcohol detox, in-patient treatment, out-patient treatment, short term treatment (30 days or less), long term treatment (90 days or longer).
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We design personalized treatment programs to provide each abuser with the greatest chance of a successful recovery outcome. Our comprehensive networking system works hand in hand with all of the drug treatment centers in Missouri. At Drug Rehab Missouri we know that each individual is unique and are treated as such. Deciding upon a treatment option in Missouri, or anywhere can be a daunting task for any individual or family, we will guide you through each step of a comprehensive treatment plan for you or your loved one. We are determined in our mission, that every drug and/or alcohol abuser in Missouri. that has a desire to change their life will be given a chance to recover from their addiction and we are dedicated to ensuring that they are given the opportunity to do so.
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We realize that each individual in Missouri. is in a different financial situation and we will find treatment options for each individual regardless of their financial situation. No matter what your financial situation everyone will receive the treatment help they are looking for.
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866-407-4380
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More potent "white" heroin is making inroads to Missouri
A potent form of heroin is taking hold in the St. Louis, Missouri area, making addiction more accessible than ever and raising the risk of increased violence among traffickers, authorities say.
So-called white heroin is displacing black tar heroin here as it has in some larger cities, according to surveys by the Drug Enforcement Administration. Officials say the switch to white heroin comes as heroin use here is growing and appears to be spreading to younger addicts.
White heroin is of particular concern because it does not need to be injected. That provides appeal to people who are squeamish about giving themselves shots of black tar, either because they don't like needles or they fear the spread of AIDS or hepatitis through shared hypodermics.
"Traffickers are able to market this heroin better by saying you can snort it or smoke it," said William Renton Jr., special agent in charge of the DEA office in St. Louis, Missouri.
Until now, black tar heroin from Mexico has dominated the St. Louis, Missouri market, authorities say. White heroin comes from Afghanistan and southwest Asia.
White heroin also is considerably more potent, raising the risk of overdoses. The white heroin found in the St. Louis, Missouri area this year is as high as 28 percent pure morphine, nearly twice the purity commonly found in the black tar variety, Renton explained.
Heroin traditionally has been associated with older junkies in urban areas, but it now appears to be making inroads with young people of diverse backgrounds.
"A lot of times the stereotype is that a typical heroin user is an older person ... but that's not what you see," said Dr. Heidi Israel, an assistant professor at St. Louis, Missouri University School of Medicine who studies heroin abuse.
Statistics from drug treatment now reflect users from all racial groups, and include more young people than in the past, she explained. "There is a younger population that is being represented in the treatment data, more 18- to 24-year-olds."
Federal prosecutors in St. Louis, Missouri brought heroin trafficking charges against 53 people in the year that ended Sept. 30. That was up from 45 the prior year, which itself represented an increase from 21 the year before that.
In Southern Illinois, federal prosecutors say their caseload of heroin trafficking prosecutions has been steady since 2000, with no more than 10 defendants a year.
Renton said increased heroin use is more than an illusion from stepped-up enforcement. "We're getting informant information and source reporting that there is an increase in heroin," he emphasized.
A new drug in town
The DEA says it became aware of the growing presence of white heroin through a program intended to track trends.
Under its Domestic Monitoring Program, the agency uses informers to make 10 purchases of heroin on the streets of each of an array of major cities four times a year. Lab testing determines the samples' purity and origin.
For years, black tar predominated here, with white heroin showing up about once a year, Renton said.
But in the first quarter of this year, five of the 10 purchases in the St. Louis, Missouri area were white heroin, he reported, which is more typically found in New York, Chicago and other larger cities.
In the third quarter, the agency focused its purchases in the Metro East area and came up with the white variety six times out of 10. There were no samples taken in the second quarter for lack of funding, he said.
Israel cautioned that it is "premature" to conclude that white heroin is widely available, noting that what undercover informers are able to buy may not represent a true proportion of what's for sale on the streets.
However, she acknowledged that it is understood among drug users that some groups with Nigerian connections are selling white heroin in St. Louis, Missouri. Renton confirmed that at least one such group is under investigation.
Booming business
Whatever the type, heroin sales in the area appear to be thriving.
In one small area of St. Louis, Missouri, a gang sold an estimated $100,000 worth of black tar each week until police broke it up last year, according to federal authorities.
The gang's two leaders, Brian White and David Foston, used safe houses and had midlevel managers deploy dealers on the streets in its territory around the intersection of Cass and Glasgow avenues, according to the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
One informer told authorities that Foston had boasted of being on the verge of reaching the $1 million mark in drug proceeds, according to a sworn statement by ATF Agent Mark Demas.
The ring's business was so good that it sometimes caused traffic backups, Assistant U.S. Attorney Jim Delworth said.
Its undoing was that its base was near the new Vashon High School.
St. Louis, Missouri Police Chief Joe Mokwa said the ring was a "pre-eminent source of supply" that "was particularly salient to us because of its proximity to a major high school."
The new Vashon, at 3035 Cass Avenue, is just a block and a half from the intersection with Glasgow. It opened in the fall of 2002.
In December 2002, authorities arrested White, Foston and 16 others. All have pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in St. Louis, Missouri to heroin trafficking charges.
Another big ring prosecuted last year included members of some families involved in the Moorish Science Temple of America, a cultlike group that saw many of its members imprisoned for heroin trafficking and violent crimes in the early 1990s.
Mean streets
Heroin peddlers are known to have a special propensity for violence, Mokwa suggested. "Heroin traffickers seem to have a more aggressive stance in controlling their operations than some of the other narcotics groups."
Some of the recent cases in federal court seem to bear that out.
In June 2001, an informer told authorities he had heard two members of the Foston drug ring boast about killing Robert "Beaver" Wilson by hanging him with a rope struck over a door.
Police checked records and found that on May 22, 2001, Wilson's death had been reported to police as a suicide. The medical examiner's office later determined it was a homicide.
Another informer later said the men meant to scare Wilson but that "things got out of hand."
One of the two men named by the informer later pleaded guilty to conspiracy in a heroin case and got 10 years in prison. His lawyer said he had "vehemently denied" a role in any killings. Neither of the men named by informers was ever charged with Wilson's murder. Officials say that is not surprising. The principal informer had a record of five convictions, and thus would have had dubious credibility with a jury.
Wilson's death was not unusual. During the investigation of the White-Foston gang, one informer was slain in a drive-by shooting, according to the ATF.
Another informer warned officials that the gang had been involved with murders, assaults and armed robberies, according to the ATF.
In another case, a man accused of distributing heroin, Qusai Mahasin, arranged from prison for a witness against him to be shot last year, prosecutors said.
The witness survived and limped into federal court to testify. Mahasin was convicted of attempting to murder a witness and heroin trafficking. He was sentenced to 55 years in prison.
When police arrested Leo Adams, one of the alleged leaders of another heroin ring, in October 2001, he was using a colostomy bag, the result of gunshot wounds.
He had been shot multiple times on May 26, 2001, the ATF said. Adams, who admitted that he was awaiting a shipment of up to 300 ounces of heroin at the time of his arrest, later pleaded guilty and got 30 years in prison.
Devastated families
While the people who buy and sell heroin often die or go to prison, broken families are left behind to bear witness to the drug's destructive power.
Randall Jackson pleaded guilty in 2001 in federal court to possession with intent to distribute heroin. In January, a judge sent him to prison for 12 years.
His mother, Geraldine Jackson, who has held a job with a large local company for 35 years, said it was desire for material possessions that led her son astray. "When the kids get out there, they want to have all the stuff," she said.
"The money aspect of it clouds a person's judgment," added her husband, Vernon Jackson, who recently retired from work as a supervisor in a federal agency. "These guys are making hundreds of thousands of dollars. They can't make that kind of money at McDonald's. And everybody wants these $100 tennis shoes, the jackets, and all that. Cars, clothes and women - it comes with the trade."
The parents said they had fought their son's involvement in drug trafficking for more than a decade. "Fifteen years I've been struggling with this at night, and I prayed before I answered the phone that it was not him dead," Geraldine Jackson said.
Now, Randall Jackson's four children are in different homes in St. Louis, Missouri and Atlanta, three with different mothers. One, a 9-year-old boy, is living with Vernon and Geraldine Jackson.
"The people who really suffer are the parents," Geraldine Jackson said after her son's sentencing. "Instead of being grandparents, we're going to become parents again."
Deaths are on the rise
A series of bleak statistics also describe the drug's destructive power. In 1993, seven people died from heroin - or a mixture of heroin and cocaine and other substances - in St. Louis, Missouri County, according to the county medical examiner's office. That number has risen erratically over the past decade, reaching 24 by 2002.
It is an equal-opportunity killer. Of those 24, officials said 21 were white and three were black.
Of the 21 people who died of heroin overdoses in St. Louis, Missouri that year, 14 were black and seven were white, the medical examiner's figures show.
By contrast, Madison County has no heroin deaths in 2002 or 2003, officials said.
To some extent, concerns about heroin are overshadowed by methamphetamine, said Jim Topolski, a policy expert at the Missouri Department of Mental Health.
Yet one national survey shows that from 1992 to 2002, heroin replaced cocaine as the drug most often cited by people - after alcohol - who are admitted to drug treatment programs.
There is no question that heroin is far more dangerous than most drugs, said Dr. Chris Long, director of toxicology in the medical examiner's offices of St. Louis, Missouri and St. Louis, Missouri County. He said it is heavily addictive and depresses the central nervous system so effectively that sometimes breathing just stops.
Drug Rehab by County
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