Informants just weren't enough

The Vancouver police department wasn't satisfied with turning addicts into informants and putting their lives at risk by ratting out their friends.Now they've taken some poor sucker that was so desperate for drug treatment that he turned himself in,into a poster boy for duplicity.This obvious mental patient was coerced into making a video in favor of police chief Chiu's jailing of chronic offenders for more than two years.The deputy,a fellow named DePard actually said that crime was the worst it has been ever in the history of mankind.I won't even comment on the banality of this overstatement.There is no question that the Vancouver police have abandoned any attempt at truth or keeping the argument at a meaningful level.Parading this poor and obviously sick individual,even with his voice altered and his face obliterated,in front of the public is a desperate and contemptuous act.If this guy actually had to turn himself in to the police and beg for a federal sentence it points out the pathetically small choices an addict has in this Province.While on the one hand we are told that there are now drug courts offering treatment instead of prison.We have the police saying we need to send people to prison and this person agreeing with them.Where is this treatment we've been inundated with stories of?Why does this person,who admits that he has his addiction under control and is only doing drugs a few times a week,so unable to access a treatment program?Something is rotten here and we are not being told the truth.The fact that different drugs have different courses of treatment and different success rates for the programs is confusing the issue and there seems to be little will to sort out the differences.This man is a cocaine addict.I don't know what the success rates are for cocaine treatment but I'm sure they are far and away more successful than any heroin programs.We need people that understand the differences and can make relevant suggestions to be asked for input.If we continue to make policy based on hysteria,even police hysteria,we will get nowhere.It's time we stopped asking representatives from the treatment community for suggestions as they have a vested interest in keeping things just as they are.It becomes more obvious every day that there are holes in our safety net.Having the police make this video was a mistake as it doesn't show what they think it does.This video shows we need more treatment,not more prison.To the contrary,it points out the necessity to open up more facilities that can offer the treatment that some addicts are obviously looking for.