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Disclaimer: Real name and cult name have been withheld for privacy reasons.Johnny is a normal guy, except that he used to sell 5000-10 000$ of smack a day and prosecutors have wanted to have him jailed for 14 years.Some people sell cars, some sell lemonade, and others sell heroin. Drug trafficking is made profitable by an ongoing drug prohibition that has been sweeping the globe since the 19th century. Because it is a decentralized, unregulated, and hidden market, it is one of the most misunderstood in our economy. Yet, people from all sectors of society get high and they need someone to provide quality stuff that will make them forget whatever bullshit lives they may be enduring.Becoming a drug dealer is not what most people envision for themselves when they grow up. In general, it is their environments that make them turn to the black market. Socio-economic factors, childhood trauma, and life choices can all lead people to deal drugs.In order to know more about how an individual becomes a major drug dealer, but also how this person can learn from their mistakes, I spoke to Johnny. This man, who is in his late thirties, often comes to my place of work to get tattooed.I guess that I had a prejudgment of what I thought a hardcore drug dealer would be like, so when Johnny told me that he used to sell pcp, acid, weed, hash, shrooms, cocaine, and heroin, I was quite surprised. He was a nice, polite, and generous guy. But the more I knew about his life story, the more his ‘career’ in the drug trade made sense.At four years old, Johnny’s parents left their home in Montreal and brought him to West Virginia. They had decided to make this change in order to join a “spiritual community”,which turned out to be a cult. When he got there, they separated him from his parents. Johnny thought that he had been abandoned and did not see his parents for a whole year. During that time, he suffered major physical and sexual abuses from the “spiritual leaders” a.k.a fucking pedophiles that were there. They told him that if he ever told anyone, they would kill his family.His parents, after some time, ?decided to send Johnny back to Canada, but pressures from the cult and threat of exile made them bring him back. Johnny stayed there for another year and a half, until his parents finally arranged a scheme to leave for good. So at six years old, young Johnny was back in Montreal.Fast forward to eight years old. Johnny and a friend were playing at the friend’s house and found some white rock on the table. At the time, Johnny wasn’t too sure what it was but his friend had a good idea. When the parents were out, they smoked the unidentified, very crack-like substance. The kids got ‘mad high’ and Johnny remembers bad tripping.Crack Cocaine“My friend gave me some weed to calm down, and then I realized that was what my father smelled like!”Johnny got home and began stealing from his father’s herb stash. By nine years old, he was already trading the marijuana for acid and pcp and by eleven, he was selling the weed to make his own cash.“After two years, my father understood what was up.”Johnny was grounded, and from my understanding, it was pretty violent. But that did not stop the young entrepreneur. He dealt small amounts for a while and made some cash at an early age.At 14 years old, he was shooting up heroin for the first time.Heroin Kit“Basically, the way i looked at it, there was both a mental an physical aspect. Mentally, I stopped giving a fuck about anything, and physically, all tension was gone, i was floating on a cloud. I was nodding off and waking up, kind of in a trance, a different world. It was better than any other drug I had tried. It was euphoric, and hit within a second after injecting it. There was heat going through my whole body as soon as I finished the shot. It was as if i was floating on a wave where none of my problems could catch up to me.”Between the ages of 15 and 18 years old, Johnny lived in foster homes, in his parent’s house, and on the streets. He would frequently sleep in squats, on rooftops, and in shelters, and made new acquaintances on the streets. Drugs were an escape from the hard reality. Pcp, acid, shrooms, marijuana, cocaine, and heroin were all gateways to different worlds which could be combined and experimented with in an array of possibilities.Eventually, Johnny was able to get a welfare check and moved into his own apartment with his girlfriend. It wasn’t long before the negative effects of the drugs were felt. His girlfriend had an overdose at 18. That was a big reality check for Johnny, so he stopped using drugs. The break lasted a year.“I started again at 19, and it all went downhill from there.”Johnny began to shoot up everyday, and in order to afford his habit, he started to deal heroin, and basically, all the other drugs that he was using at the time.“I was selling one or two grams of heroin a day, which I would buy from either Turks or the Italians depending on the days. That alone was bringing in 200-300$ a day. And with all the drugs I was selling, I was making close to 1000$ in profit daily.”Cash rules everything around me.Economically, heroin is a good product to be selling. Users, who get addicted, need their fix every single day, and the quantities rise as time goes by. So there is always a demand for it, but supply is where the genius lies. Since the substance is prohibited under the Schedule 1 drug laws (in Canada) concerning opium and its derivatives, the price rises exponentially. What costs two dollars a gram in Afghanistan, where 87% of the heroin is produced, costs over two hundred dollars a gram when it hits the North-American streets.“More money came in, so I reinvested in bigger quantities. I began buying in bulk, kilos at a time, one or two per month. I had clients buying over a hundred dollars for their personal use every single day. Doctors, lawyers, teachers, and people from every sector in the city needed their drugs, and I was there to supply it. Even though I was making good money, the only time I was happy was when I smoked joints before bed.”When Johnny decided to get on methadone at 20 years old, he was using less and selling more. Profits could go up to 5000$ every day. But when you’ve got a market worth that much, others want it.“I got in beefs with other dealers and eventually got robbed. So I slowed down and decided to concentrate on other things.”Johnny went to therapy at 24 years old, he tried to go back to school and applied to university, but failing a history exam was enough to get him back on heroin. For a few years, he was in and out of therapy and on and off drugs. But even though he made efforts to get in the right path, troubles caught up to him. He was arrested and charged with trafficking heroin and cocaine.Bordeaux Prison in Montreal.“I did 20 months in Bordeaux. But instead of getting tools I needed to succeed in there, I started selling drugs in prison. The only things I concentrated on in prison were making money and how I would go about dealing even more when I’d come out.”The vicious cycle came around again. Since Johnny did not have work experience, higher education, or any possibility of getting a good job, he got right back into dealing. The quantities just kept rising and the money kept flowing. Things quickly became hectic. He was selling an average of 5000-7000$ a day. He began living in multiple apartments and hotel rooms, buying everything he wanted cash, and during this time, he actually stopped using. And just as things were looking up for him, the law caught up. As he was coming out of a hotel, some police officers approached him to talk. Apparently, he began to look nervous, so they decided to search him. Even though the search was illegal, they found 10 000$ on him and over ten grams of heroin. He was charged with possession and trafficking of heroin.Before his trial could even begin, Johnny, while out on bail, was arrested one more time in another investigation. Police raided his home and found an astonishing 212 grams of heroin, along with 54 000$ in cash.“Even though that sounds really bad, it could have been worst. In my different safe houses, I had more than 1.5 kilos of heroin and over half a million in cash. When I think about it, I figure that I am lucky that was all that they found. They sent me to Bordeaux for fifteen months while I was awaiting my trial. I spent my time smoking and dealing weed inside.”The prosecutors wanted to hit him hard. They were talking about 14 years in federal prison. So Johnny got himself a good lawyer and prepared for the worst. In the end, he got a nine year sentence. He would have to spend this time in Archambault, a federal prison just outside of Montreal.Archambault Federal Correctional Facility“When I got there, I decided to change for the first time. I decided to finish my high school, stop selling drugs in prison, and work towards getting completely clean.”The first step in order to reach his goal was to get off methadone. Surprisingly enough, he went from 250mg to 0mg in just 10 months. That cleared his thoughts and allowed him to succeed in school quickly and efficiently. He was then able to concentrate on the criminological-follow up with his parole officer. Since the officer saw that joey was putting a lot of effort into his plans and had solid options for when he would get out, he sent him in front of the parole board.Once that was completed, he became eligible for parole and was able to get out of there within a few years (in Quebec prisons, overcrowding has allowed inmates to complete only two-thirds of their sentence). Johnny spent a year in a halfway house and a few years on probation. Now, he works as a forklift operator and makes all of his money legally.John Abbott CollegeJohnny has even given talks to John Abbott college criminology students. He has told them about his experience and the causes of his problems. While this program is generally reserved for lifers, the halfway house believed that Johnny’s experience was worth sharing. With the students, he has discussed the flaws and strengths of the system. He hopes that these future criminologists will learn that every soul is worth saving, and that a person can always change.Prohibition creates the ideal conditions for a pricey, violent, and unstable market. Johnny’s experience in dealing drugs demonstrates that many of those who get into the business have gravitated there by past experiences and/or in order to satisfy their own addictions. For people who have been marginalized in our consumerist system, drugs are just a new commodity. ................
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