They heard about the dangers of the latest drug that could knock them and their friends down - OxyContin, a powerful painkiller. This is my daughter - her ashes in a marble urn. So, you guys need to be alert, be aware and be educated. Berry spoke as photographs of Karen Lynn, from a little girl in a First Communion outfit to a pretty preteen in a cheerleader's uniform, flashed on a screen behind her. The project, taught by narcotics officers, recovering addicts and victims' families, lasted more than an hour at the school at 6301 N. Second St. in Oak Lane.
Police plan to take it to other city and area schools.
It was initiated after Deputy Police Commissioner Sylvester Johnson and Raymond Rooney, chief inspector of narcotics, viewed a New Castle County, Del., police outreach program on the dangers of drugs and decided the heroin problem in the Philadelphia region was serious enough to warrant a similar program. Philadelphia police in recent years have been increasingly concerned about hundreds of suburbanites who drive to North Philadelphia to buy illegal drugs every day. Younger and younger addicts, drawn by the purity and relatively low cost of heroin in the city, have popularized the drug even more. The rate of treatment for heroin addiction in the seven-county Philadelphia suburbs jumped from 77 to 84 per 100,000 people between 1995 and 1998. That's a . . .