Campaign targets drug abuse

Myakka City’s William Rohrer was a thrill-seeker who loved racing dirt bikes.

He would also be the first to open the door for an elderly woman.

But after he became hooked on heroin, he became angry and dangerous, said his mother, Joy Kerrivan.

“He thought he was 10 feet tall and bulletproof,” Kerrivan said.

Kerrivan said fentanyl-laced heroin was the drug that killed her son in October 2016. He had been clean for a month, but after working a side job and earning some cash, he bought drugs Oct. 14, and three days later he was dead at 27 years old.

“I had told him it didn’t have to be this way,” she said of a time four months earlier when she sought to have him arrested in hopes of forcing him to break his addiction. “I told him, ‘You just have to get clean.’

“He wasn’t supposed to die. He was supposed to grow old. He was supposed to take over the family business (Pit Stop Sanitation).”

Rohrer had become addicted to prescription drugs from 2006-2007 at 16 years old. His addiction grew over time, and he went from taking prescription pills to harder drugs, like heroin.

Kerrivan said she has dealt with guilt, as well as the stigmas attached to parenting an addicted person and those faced by the addicts themselves.

“It’s an automatic condemnation,” Kerrivan said. “(The drug epidemic) affects everybody. It’s not just the rich or the poor. They’re doctors. They’re lawyers. It’s an everybody’s problem.”

Kerrivan said raising awareness is a critical first step for change.

Drug Free Manatee’s Addictions Crisis Taskforce will launch a new media campaign Oct. 1 called “Now is the Time. Your Life Matters.” It was announced Sept. 12 at East County’s District 3 Sheriff’s Office.

The campaign features 30-second public service announcements to share the stories of four Manatee County residents who have overcome substance abuse disorders. The announcements will run on Spectrum networks, social media and at Regal Oakmont 8 Movie Theater.

“We hope it decreases the stigma of addition,” Drug Free Manatee Community Relations Director Merab Favorite said. “It can happen to anybody.”

Drug Free Manatee has partnered with Mike Dunn, founder of Your Life Matters Project, to direct those suffering substance use disorders to local treatment and rehabilitation facilities through Dunn’s website, yourlifemattersproject.org. The website also will show longer versions of the announcements.

Kerrivan said such campaigns can change perceptions. She said people don’t understand how drugs change people’s behaviors and personalities.

“(Addicts) need to know they can recover,” Kerrivan said. “But it takes a village. You have to have support, people you can trust. Society is so condemning.”

Manatee County’s Brett Ramsden is one of the recovering  addicts sharing his story in the media campaign. He started drinking alcohol and doing drugs in high school, although he had been a straight-A student with a “great” childhood. He simply wanted to be cool.

“I thought I could balance both,” he said of academics and recreational drugs.

He rehabbed more than once without success and had nine felony convictions, eight of which were during a three-month span in 2013. He’s been clean five years, is married and has a 1-year-old daughter.

“Now my life is amazing,” he said. “Sharing my story gives people hope.”

Manatee County was considered the epicenter of Florida’s opioid addiction crisis in 2015 when it had 11 overdoses per day. Manatee County Sheriff’s Office says that figure is down to less than one a day — a trend that has been ongoing since July 2017.