KHS students steered straight

KELLOGG — Sometimes the best way to avoid substance abuse is to hear from someone who has suffered from it.

Documentary filmmaker, published author and international motivational speaker, Michael DeLeon spoke to Kellogg High School students Friday afternoon about his life mission. This mission is to educate youth to stay on the right path by avoiding serious life problems — specifically drugs and alcohol.

“I’m trying to fight America’s pandemic. I’m not talking about COVID. The pandemic that I’m fighting is addiction and suicide.”

DeLeon spoke to the packed gym with passion as he recalled his struggle with drugs and alcohol starting at age 11. His introduction to drugs started with his friend offering him a cigarette, which later led to alcohol and marijuana, and then later meth and heroin. Following years of drug abuse, he ended up going to Rahway State Prison (East Jersey State Prison) in 1995 and was incarcerated for twelve years.

Since 1968, children have been brought into Rahway Prison to scare them into correcting their behavior. During DeLeon’s stay in prison, he was asked to run the Scared Straight program, eventually working on season 2 of the A&E television show — “Beyond Scared Straight.”

“Here is the concept of scared straight. You have a kid like Johnny who gets into trouble. Smoking weed, disobeying parents, vandalizing, on probation. And the parents don’t know what to do.”

He explained children were then in prison for eight hours, with incarcerated individuals spitting in their faces, screaming at them and essentially scaring them. Ideally, these kids would get too scared, turn their lives around, and start following all the rules.

He did five seasons of Beyond Scared Straight, but was never happy with the work and did not feel it was the best approached.

His wife would visit him in prison, and he complained about the program to her week after week. After weeks of complaining, she finally asked him why he continued.

“At the end of every session, they give you one-on-one time with the kid. They sit you at a cafeteria table across from this kid and there is no screaming, yelling, threatening. The facilitator would tell us that this is when you get into their head.”

DeLeon’s wife then told him, “Why don’t you try to get into their heart. You are only going to change them by getting into their heart.”

After getting out of prison in 2007, DeLeon started Steered Straight Inc. This non-profit organization is aimed to carry out an important message to today’s youth on the dangers of drugs, gang involvement and associated criminal activity.

His approach then changed and instead of using fear to motivate those he speaks with, DeLeon uses a “no holds back” and honest approach — telling stories of other students he has met.

“Three weeks ago in Missouri, I attended my 278th funeral since 2010. This was a funeral for a young 17 year-old girl named Faith. Faith was experiencing a lot of anxiety, and eventually a friend told her she should try the drug Xanax. They went to snapchat and bought what they believed to be Xanax from a dealer, posing as another 17 year old.”

The pill ended up not being Xanax, but fentanyl instead, and Faith died from an overdose.

“I’m all for celebrating the person's life. What I don’t want to do is celebrate 17 years of it. I want to celebrate you guys when you are dying at age 150. 130. I want you all to live a long life.”

To wrap up his presentation, DeLeon told the crowd a story of the first time, at age 11, he was given a cigarette, a red solo cup full of beer and his first puff of a marijuana joint. No one had a visceral reaction to any moment of the story.

“If I said my friend wrapped my arm in a tourniquet and jabbed a heroin needle into my veins at age 11, would that have shocked you? Oh thank God,” he said. “I want you to be as shocked about nicotine, alcohol and marijuana. And you’re not. The problem with that is heroin, meth, fentanyl and cocaine starts with alcohol, nicotine and marijuana 91% of the time.”

DeLeon currently has four films on addiction and recovery. In addition, he has testified for the Obama, Trump and Biden administrations.

“I don’t care who is in the White House. I’m not a politician. There is no D or R after my name. The only letter I care about is “K” for kids.”

For more information about the Steered Straight program and the work of Michael DeLeon, you can visit the website www.steeredstraight.org.