Drug-Addicts Cause Pain to Families

All names have been changed to protect the storyteller. I have also withheld locations, because of the smallness of the hometown

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Claire’s eyes look tired when she talks about her older brother. His drug addiction wreaked havoc for years on their family and although he is clean now, it was a long and rocky path to recovery.

Her brother, Brian, had been abusing drugs since he was about 14.  

Need-Based Crimes Do More Harm than Help

1 in 28 American children have an incarcerated parent. This is a dramatic increase over 2 decades ago when this number was 1 in 125, according to a 2010 report from the Pew Charitable Trusts.The study also found that parents of children under age 18 make up more than half of the incarcerated population.

Falling in Love with a Convict

I know Santa Camacho as my boyfriend’s aunt. When I reached out looking for this week’s profile, she volunteered. As we spoke, I decided that I simply wanted to tell her story, because it is so often left unheard. No numbers, no figures, just her story.

It was a fluke how Santa Camacho met her husband, Jose Carlos.

In 1997, before they’d met, he was convicted of burglary and robbery in the second degree and given 10 years.