Dave and I met at a drop in center supporting active users in Denver.

People fear the syringe. It’s a scary thing. It pokes, it hurts. Addicts become numb to it. It doesn’t hurt. It’s actually a pleasure. It’s a sixth sense in a sick sort of way. That’s what scares people.

People are prejudiced. There are even drug addicts who are prejudiced against needle users. Like, “Aww, I never did that, I never put that in my arm, my virgin veins here.” It’s their fear that brings them there because a drug is a drug no matter which way you do it. It’s ignorance.

Q: Why did you start injecting?

I started injecting steroids first. I was a competitive body builder in the Colorado circuit. I never went national, but I was competitive. Before I started injecting steroids, I was scared to death of needles. But by the time I got done doing my first couple of cycles I was up to 205 pounds, 9% body fat. The needles you used for 22 gauge, one and half inches. When it came to using drugs I wasn’t scared no more. A little 28 gauge is tiny compared to that.

Q: The steroid injections were intramuscular? With bigger syringes you are saying?

Huge. Any way you put something in your body, it’s going to get in your bloodstream. One way is slower, the other is direct mainline. I feel though, going from smoking to injecting, I gained more control on my consumptions, my sleeping patterns. I would smoke and that residual high would keep coming back, I am a speed addict, because it would slowly absorb into my lungs, whereas when I inject I can count on anywhere from 4-16 hours tops, usually it’s more like 8-12. I don’t know if that’s the case for all addicts, I’ve seen a lot who inject lose their minds because they don’t know how. I was fortunate to be in the nutritional business to have a good understanding.

Q: Were steroids your first drug use?

I’ve always smoked pot. That is the doorway drug. I started smoking pot when I was about 11 years old.

Q: That’s young. Why?

My atmosphere. I came from a split home. My father was a police officer, my mother was a junkie addict. Didn’t work out. They split up. My father divorced his wife as well as her kids when I was seven years old. So I was exposed directly to her alcoholism and drug abuse in a biker kind of life. The first time I saw speed, I was about 9, 10 years old and they were snorting it at the time. They asked, “Do you know what this is?” I said cocaine. “No, that stuff’s bad, this is a white man’s thing.” So I was initiated into believing it was okay because it was a white man’s thing. That’s when prejudice began to set in as well, which I fortunately came to realize, prejudicism is one of the number one problems in this country. I cured myself of that, I refuse to be ill when it comes to people.

Q: Tell me about your drug history, how things progressed.

My drug history started in the gangs of Denver. I started selling marijuana for people when I was 12, 13 years old. They called us runners just like they do everywhere else. I would run and earn my marijuana that way. I realized there was money involved in it as well. I started moving up in the world and started peddling cocaine and speed. By the time I was 17 years old I was using speed. I had a little girl. At 19, I quit using speed for five years, six years.

I kind of think about how many people I drugged down with me now… I never thought about that before…

Q: What do you mean?

Just the extreme prejudice, pushing prejudice into white boys’ ears, drugs in their face, how I deteriorated their mind, their heart; how many of them are exactly like I am now. I don’t consider myself bad off. I maintained as an addict for several years. I also don’t know what I do is wrong. I wonder if that’s not society’s opinion. I’m not that bad of a person, maybe society is the one who’s twisted its arms.

"I’m not that bad of a person, maybe society is the one who’s twisted its arms."

Q: Are you still in touch with your kid?

As much as possible. Me and mom had a pretty bitter divorce. We were together 14 years or more. We’re 30, so it was half our lives. You can imagine it was pretty rough. She didn’t leave due to drug use. She left due to fornication, cheating. I can’t lie. She knew what I was when she married me, so that wasn’t an issue. When I mean, “what I was,” I mean an addict. I take everything to extremes.

Q: Why do you think?

I think we’re all obsessive compulsive in one way or another. Obsessive people tend to do the best they can for as long as they can and when they get bored they move on to something else.

I won’t condone drugs. I don’t think anybody ought to get started on them. I really don’t. Especially because of the way this society looks at them. Ridiculed, patronized, kicked to the curb. Less than, that’s not how you should spend your life feeling. If I could take back any one kid or person or anyone I started or hooked up, I would. But I can’t. But I can say that if you are addicted you can learn to live with yourself. To learn to overcome these things that are out there. You can quit anytime you want. There’s help out there. You can also function as a practicing addict. It’s all on you. It doesn’t have anything to do with anybody else. It was to do with your will and how you feel about yourself. If you knew your heart was going to explode tomorrow, would you continue to get high? That’s a good question to ask yourself. I wouldn’t. But the scary thing is, your heart could explode tomorrow. You got to take a risk. You’re always taking a risk.

Q: So are you trying to quit at this point?

I have no intentions of quitting.

Q: How does that fit with what you just said?

I’ve weighed out my options. I know what makes me happy and I know what doesn’t make me happy. I’m not happy in this world the way it’s going anyway. The one thing that keeps me numb is getting high. If I found something that could replace that, then maybe. But with the loss of my family, my children, everything else, I just don’t see myself ever really wanting to recover. Not only that, like I said, I’ve accepted that I am an addict and I’m okay with that. I feel that the people with the problem, my fellow society, they pre-judge people. Immediately upon seeing them. The man asking for change on the street could be a millionaire, but the people on the street have the balls to look down on him like he’s scum. Those people could be next. I wasn’t a millionaire, but I made my money, I paid my bills, I had my home.

Now, I don’t beg for change, but I’ve thought about it. You have to look at where you’re going and what could happen. It could happen overnight too. Maybe it ain’t so bad to reach in your pocket and give somebody a quarter every once in a while.

Q: Are you doing this to spite society?

I don’t care what society thinks. I’m doing this because I’m addicted. I’m addicted to changing the way I feel and the atmosphere around me.

Q: Have you tried a treatment program in the past?

I grew up in them. I know what it takes to quit. People need a support system, a program, AA, some people. I don’t buy you can’t quit. It’s up to you. Heroin’s a different thing. People become ill on heroin. I am a speed addict. I feel for the heroin addicts out there.

Q: Why?

You see these people just sick. They ain’t got no money to get high, so they’ll steal from their next door neighbor… It’s a long way out. There’s just methadone and methadone’s for life…. I consider myself… fortunate. Where I’m at. Snfff. Heroin addicts are some of the most heroin addicts you’ll ever meet…. They’ll give you the shirt right off their back but also steal your brother’s bike to get high… Ha ahh. Not everyone’s like that. There are some thieves and liars. Their rush is the adrenaline because they’re getting away with it.

Q: Tell me about getting syringes in this state.

The mayor, they passed a law where it is illegal in this state to possess a syringe or to sell syringes without a prescription. Maybe six years ago, four years ago. What that has done, is left the mainstream public at risk of catching HIV, Hepatitis, and any other blood borne disease because of us. We as the addicts are still going to sleep with your children if we have the urge to and your children are still going to sleep with us if they have the urge to.

Some people don’t care and they’ll stick a dirty syringe in your child’s arm or your brother’s arm. Just to get them hooked so they can get their next fix. Or maybe because they see pain in their eyes and they want to help them. Besides that, it hurts us. We have to use the same points over and over and over again. It leaves everyone to risk. In fact, it opens risk up even more.

Q: Why more?

Like I said earlier. If I have feelings for your daughter and she has feelings for me, we’re still going to go there anyway. Spur of the moment, no condom. Now your daughter’s got Hepatitis C. There’s nothing I can do to help you now. There needs to be needle exchange programs for the safety of all the public, for non users as well.

I don’t tell people I shoot up on a daily basis. I’m not going to leave myself wide open and get frickin kicked to the curb.

Q: Is there needle exchange in Denver?

Nope. Some underground.

Q: Where get syringes without a prescription?

It’s up to the discretion of the pharmacist whether to sell without a prescription. I, myself, am going to get involved. Put myself at risk of doing time to help pass clean syringes around in this state, regardless of the consequences.

There’s a national needle exchange where I can send back 1,000 used, dirty syringes and they’ll send me 1,000 back. I can pass those out to help stop the spread of HIV, Hepatitis C, and blood borne disease. Then I can do what little I can to help people in this country. If I can help one person keep from getting Hep C.

Q: How much is a syringe on the street?

We tend to give them out to each other if we have them. That’s what I don’t understand. If we can try to help each other, what’s the problem with everybody else trying to protect themselves from us? Why not give us the right to purchase syringes or pick them up from a free clinic. All they do is put themselves at risk of more thievery and more blood borne diseases. That’s just the bottom line. I’ve walked into Walgreen’s myself, tell them I get confused, that I’m a diabetic. When they go to the back to get another box, I’ll pull a pack out and stick it under my shirt. I don’t want to get Hep C. I don’t want to get HIV. Nor do I want to spread it. And I don’t want to shove a dull-frickin pencil in my arm either. It leads to collapsing the veins and then the worst kind of addict, where they shoot between their toes or their armpits; anywhere they can find a vein. Dull needles… Would you want your son or daughter using a dull needle or any of your family members?

Q: Is no option but a dull needle helping people enter treatment?

Oh, no way. The thing is, that little silver tube, bleach doesn’t kill anything. Hepatitis C has been known to survive. Addicts will clean as a last resort. Even if they clean with bleach and water, it’s still sharing.

I have a friend, who’s only been using on the streets of Denver for one year and he’s already contracted Hepatitis C. One year. He could be dead in five.

I think drugs should be legalized. A whole lot of people die real fast, just because of ignorance, “It’s legal now.” Then there would be a second phase. By the third phase, there would be more control on the purity of the drug. How it’s used, where it’s used. But our government’s too busy with a War on Drugs and there’s too much money involved in that. I’d like the government to know we’re on to their bullshit. They buy, they sell, they repossess, and they sell again just to keep us down.

Q: From Denver?

Native.

Q: How hard is it to get treatment around here?

It’s pretty hard to get in for a lot of centers. If you want it, you;ll get it I suppose. A lot of places, they’re outeach. There’s only so many beds available. I’m pretty new to the streets, I’m just now finding out what’s available. There’s a lot of underground help out there. Thank God.

Q: What do you mean you’re pretty new to the streets?

I had the same girlfriend, who became my wife from 14-28. I had obtained everything everybody else dreams of, kids, cars, house. I was a functioning addict. I’ve been on the street ever since she left me. It destroyed me. Or, I let it destroy me.

I haven’t pulled myself up and off the streets yet. I just got a home with a friend of mine. I’m hoping we can hold on to it. He’s a heroin addict, I’m a speed addict. That’s a pretty good combination. One of us can work all night, the other all day. Keep things in motion. It’s kind of like marrying your best friend.

I want to say again, I don’t condone drug use, nor do I condone turning people on to drugs anymore. I’m not saying this is a good lifestyle, but it should be accepted and recognized. A lot more people are addicted than you’d think out there. Not everybody’s going to come out and speak about it. Not everybody’s going to do an interview with you today. Not everybody’s going to let you take a picture. Because of this fear. This is a risk factor. I don’t know you. Are you a cop? Should I trust you? You don’t know me. Am I killer or am I just an addict? Or am I both?

I think there should be more education for the people who don’t use. More authentic education. Truth be told. For example, needle policy, they’ve exposed their children, themselves to disease, the likelihood of catching disease. The fact that 60% of heroin addicts are functioning addicts, work two jobs. One to cover their habit and one to pay their bills.

Q: Where did you see that figure?

I believe that might just be for Colorado. I saw it on a website. I don know most of the h addicts I’ve met do have jobs. They get sick. They get real sick. They need to get high daily. Even if it’s methadone. Methadone’s for life. Heroin can be kicked with methadone. A friend of mine died in jail from a heroin seizure. Came down, died right in the jail cell. She told them, “Something’s not right, something’s not right.” They ignored him. He died right there in the cell. It’s pretty rare, but it happens.

Q: With your use, is that everyday? How much is your habit?

I would say pretty much every day. I don’t pay, I play. That’s all I can say. Depending on quality, anywhere from a half gram to as much as I can get my hands on in one day. I do at least $50 a day.

Like I said, a lot of times, you’ve paid your dues, you know enough people, it comes back around. It’s part of society.

Q: When you were dealing, were you turning people on, or were you facilitating people already using?

There was a point- let me say here- I did not deal, I gave. I never sold drugs. Yeah, there’s people that want to try it. Ten years ago, I would have been like, “yeah, yeah, yeah, I’ll help you out.” That wasn’t right. Now, I won’t, “You have to go somewhere else dawg… You need to do this for yourself.” At the same time. If you’re going to use intravenously, maybe I am one of the best people you should talk to. I can show you how to do it right. Make sure you know about bleach and water, where the needle exchanges are, how to combine body weight by amounts of water by units of drugs you use. But I, myself, I won’t turn anyone on for the first time anymore. Especially with the needle. It’s not my job to help kill you.

The government I know for a fact has condone the use of ephedrine, caffeine and aspirin stacks which are Metabolife and these weight loss things out there. I know for a fact they are more harmful to the body than methamphetamines are. Ephedrine raises your temperature. Caffeine thins your blood and aspirin reduces your fever. Why the hell would you do something that requires aspirin? Kids were dying on the field from doing too much of this.

There is this so called conspiracy going on with methamphetamines as well. It can call psychosis. Lack of sleep in itself can cause psychosis. I believe there is a war with drugs that far exceeds what people are seeing. Maybe they want us to have a lack of control so they have control. They have outside power, bigger powers than even our federal government.

As a matter of fact, I am not high today. As we speak, I am in clear conscience now.

Q: I think some people might feel some of these comments are contradictory. If you don’t want to turn people on because it’s killing people, but you continue to inject-

That’s my choice.

Q: But let’s say in five years, if you’re not injecting, would you be in a better place than right now?

I can’t say. I succeeded on drugs one way or another for my whole life up until now. I can’t tell you that. I’m sure I’d have more drive to do what’s good for me if I had clear conscience of mind. I might be able to go to school and finish. Honestly, I probably would be in a better place, but do I even care right now? Nah. At this point I don’t.

I care about the other people out there getting high. Hopefully they’re not making some of the same mistakes me and my friends have. Getting shot and killed. I am more worried about educating them than worrying about what’s going to happen five years from now or five years ago.

Q: Why isn’t that happening to you?

I feel the only reason is by the grace of God and the practice of using safe equipment. I mean safe use, alcohol pads, tourniquettes, hazard boxes, needles.

Q: How did you learn all of these things?

I was a personal trainer for a fitness company. I learned a lot through the competition on injections. I was trained on muscle structure and the blood stream, the rest of it is common sense. Most of it, we just know watching the doctor take blood out of our arm.

Q: Where do you think you will be in a few years? Where would you like to be?

I’d like to have my family and my life back. Where I’m going to be is have a new family and a different life back. I could live under that stars in cardboard box with the right person. I am more freer than I was before. Before, I was keeping up with the Joneses. I had the house and the kids and I wasn’t happy. Five years from now I believe I will be happy. That or dead. That’s bottom line.

Q: What would you want to say to the average American out there?

Keep your kids and yourselves out of gangs. Gangs control the drug use and the drug supply. Most of it comes from the east coast. The gangs and the supply. At least for us here in Denver, we have seen a big invasion of Disciples. Biker gangs pretty much oversee what’s going on over here. Educate your kids on violence and gangs, the better chance they’re going to have surviving and staying out of the gangs.

Q: You were involved with gangs when you were younger right?

Yeah. It still affects me today. You pay you play. If you want out, you pay. I still haven’t paid my way out. You get harassed. But I’m staying where I’m at, regardless of the consequences.

Q: How big are the gangs?

Some of them are hundreds. Some of them are nationwide. Some are worldwide. Look at Hells Angels. Our government said they are the number one world wide organized crime gang. You got to ask yourself are they the good guys or the bad guys? I don’t think our government’s too much nicer.

Q: What was the benefit to you of being in a gang?

The gang I ran with didn’t condone use of drugs even though a lot of us did them. It was a white supremacy act.

Q: What caused that shift?

I saw a movie called Amistad, I saw that chain wrapped around all their ankles and that woman trying to save that baby and they kept handing her baby back… I’m an emotional creature sometimes. That little baby… went in the water… I said… I will not feel like that about people anymore. Snfff. I will not breed hate anymore. I think the number one illness is prejudice.

I was deep into my group of people. Every once in a while I still have to put my dukes up and fend for my own.

Q: How did you see this movie to begin with?

I had a friend who is also addicted now. We were out fishing and I kept saying, “Nigger this and nigger that.” He said, “Dude, you’re killing yourself. You have no room to hate anyone. Who in the hell are you?” My wife is also full blooded German and she thinks it’s a bunch of ignorance as well. They rented the movie, sat me down. I watched it. Everything changed. Immediately. To the point that my brothers- that’s what we still call each other, “What’s wrong with you?” The people that saved my ass on the streets of Denver have been the black brothers. Believe it or not. They showed me where to eat ,where to get clothed. They’ve grown up hard. They’ve been through this.

If we were to take everything and reverse it- the average Caucasian American would fall apart. We’ve been born with spoons up our ass and money shoved down our throat. It’s a whole different way of life for a black man than it is for a white man.

For example in a drug deal, a white fellow will let you slide a little bit. If you owe him some money, he’ll give you a second chance, might even let it go. But he won’t play around with a colored brother like that. He ain’t part of your game. Values and morals mean nothing without principle applied. You play you pay. You pay first, then you can play. You can get really screwed up in this system. My advice is to educate yourself. The best decision is not to even start.

You got to understand I’ve walked both sides of the world, contradictions came up because I feel for both sides. I live two different lives. I have my kids and then I have myself. I don’t want my kids to be where I’m at. Does that stop me from getting high? No, and it won’t. Unfortunately. I think we are lying to our children. I don’t subject them to it, but if they ask, I wouldn’t lie to them either.

Q: What do we lie to our children about?

How many people are out there smoking marijuana and lying about it to their kids? A lot more than you would think. And this state, Colorado was the number one pot smoking state in the union at one time. We had a big movement at the capitol for legalization. Thing is, if you’re lying to your children, you’re teaching them to lie. Already, just by hiding it. But you don’t want to subject them to it either.

Has society dubbed marijuana users as bad people? I sure as hell hope not because a lot more people use marijuana than you’d think. A lot more.

Q: If you don’t want your kids to use marijuana, why is society wrong for saying marijuana users are bad people?

I’m not going to look down on my children if they’re using. I am going to educate them. I am not going to condone them, I am not going to frickin strike them down for getting high, but I’ll strike them down for getting high and not going to work though. You pay, you play. That’s your choice, but get up and go to work. It’s important they know that. Get up and go to work. My prayers are that they don’t get high. At the same time, I am going to teach them what’s right and wrong.