INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Hoosiers hooked on heroin are driving up crime rates across Central Indiana. Experts say the best way to fight back is through substance abuse treatment. But, I-Team 8 found addicts who want to get clean are increasingly finding they have to wait weeks or even months to get help.

Heroin users can spend up to $200 a day to support their habit. And, when money runs out, many turn to crime.

Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department has already made more than 200 heroin busts so far this year — on track to break records. But, statistics now prove heroin is a problem Indiana can’t simply arrest its way out of.

CRIME COMPLICATIONS

In May, I-Team 8 reported heroin-connected crimes are on the rise across Central Indiana. Experts say the problem has only grown since then.

For Megan Berry, it’s no surprise. She should know. She’s contributed to the statistics.

“When you don’t have the drugs, you’re sick,” she said. “Physically and mentally sick. I couldn’t get out of bed. I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t drive. My legs were restless. I couldn’t do anything or think of anything but the next high. And, I’d do anything to get it.”

And, the Ripley County native says that’s exactly what she did.

“I would rob, steal, lie and cheat,” she said. “I’ve been in jail six times. I’m a convicted felon. I’ve watched 10 of my former friends overdose and die. That was my life. I used to live and I lived to use. That’s it.”

It all happened before she even turned 21 years old.

It wasn’t supposed to be this way. On paper, Berry had the perfect high school life.

“I graduated with a full ride scholarship. I made straight A’s. I played basketball and volleyball. But, I had a drinking problem. And, at one point, I (started) getting up every morning and drinking alcohol. It only took a few months before I tried heroin. And, I was hooked. I was a junkie,” she said.

Berry, now 22, is part of Indiana’s unlikely new face of addiction: young Hoosiers hooked on heroin. Like many of them, she quickly realized she needed a way out.

“I knew I didn’t want to go to prison, and I knew I didn’t want to get high no more. But, I just didn’t know how I was going to change that,” Berry said.

So, Berry reached out to a private rehab clinic for help and got a surprising response.

NO ROOM

“Six weeks,” Berry said, shaking her head. “It usually took six weeks to get in (to a rehab facility). I never made it to six weeks.”

Instead, Berry said she would be out buying heroin again, fearing the terrible symptoms of withdrawal that would set in without her fix. Many times, those fixes would be financed through crime.

It’s no surprise to substance abuse counselors at the Salvation Army Harbor Light Center, an inpatient rehab support facility in Indianapolis.

“They will desperately call here every day — in between using even,” said Larry Henry, a counselor at the Harbor Light Center. “They will stop and call and say, ‘Hey, do you guys have a bed for me yet?'”

Almost every time, the answer is no.

“Right now, it may be as little as three to four days to get into detox. But, it’s been out two weeks. It’s been out three weeks. It’s been out six weeks. And, that’s a major problem,” said Jamie Brown, the Harbor Light Center’s lead counselor.

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Here’s why: while Indiana boasts nearly two dozen private inpatient rehab clinics across the state, detox programs there aren’t cheap.

“A residential day for most clients is around $500 a day,” Henry said. “It’s very, very expensive. The length of your stay in most of those facilities is dictated by your insurance company. And, they’re only going to give you three to five days of detox treatment.”

That’s a problem for most heroin addicts.

“They don’t have any money,” said Brown. “They don’t have no insurance. We do a lot of cut rate and even free treatment. But, we’re overcrowded. Maybe that gets you 7-10 days of treatment. That’s still a big gamble. Our clients need a 90-day or 100-day process. And the ones that are able to go through it are generally successful.”

Pausing, Brown lowered his head.

“Those that don’t (go through it), we just have to pray we see them again,” he said. “Many times, we never get the chance.”

A CALL FOR HELP

“There doesn’t seem to be enough help centers where people they can go to get help and assistance,” conceded Indianapolis Public Safety Director Troy Riggs. “We’re realizing that if you do not have a middle class income, you’re probably not going to be able to get any services, because private insurance doesn’t pay for someone trying to get off of heroin.”

I-Team 8’s investigation found just five Hoosier substance abuse programs receive the bulk of state funding designated for low-income inpatient substance abuse treatment. Combined, those five facilities have a total of just 88 beds available at any given time.

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The Salvation Army’s Harbor Light Center is the only one of those facilities in Central Indiana.

And, even when patients do get in to those facilities, they often run into another problem.

“I’m on my parent’s insurance,” said Blake Bex, a 23-year-old addict from Miami County being treated at the Harbor Light Center. “It’s supposed to be good. But, it’s only covered 28 days. If you’re serious about recovery, 28 days (isn’t enough).”

Bex, already at Harbor Light for nearly six weeks, said she’s now worried she may soon be forced out.

“I’m not ready,” she said. “There’s not any treatment programs in jails or prisons that are really like this. And, that’s where I’d be if I got out: jail or prison.”

EXPANDING ACCESS

Indiana’s Family and Social Services Administration’s (FSSA) Division of Mental Health and Addiction (DMHA) funds five additional addiction treatment providers statewide. Combined, the 10 providers receive nearly $30 million in federal and state grant funding. All of the facilities include at least some treatment options for low-income individuals, but only five offer residential treatment options.

But, state figures obtained by I-Team 8 show 23,996 people sought treatment services in the last fiscal year. At least 1,598 of those patients sought 24-hour detoxification treatment.

With just 88 beds available for low income patients at any given time, state leaders admit, there’s often a shortfall of space.

“I don’t believe our current ability to meet the need is adequate,” said FSSA DMHA Director Kevin Moore. “The demand for treatment is greater than the supply of treatment providers that we’ve got, both on the outpatient side as well as the residential treatment side.”

The need is immediate, Moore added.

“It’s (at a) critical level around the state,” he told I-Team 8. “And, it’s even more critical when you get outside Indianapolis and the urban areas. The difficulties in access to care in the rural counties is significant. It’s got to be the right service at the right time. And, if you miss that window of opportunity, you run the risk of that person never coming back seeking treatment.”

The key question for federal, state and local leaders: how to expand access to help fight back?

A DIFFERENT APPROACH

“The way we’ve been looking at drugs in this state hasn’t worked,” said Marion County Superior Court Judge Jose Salinas. “What we’re doing is taking a different approach.”

Salinas runs Marion County’s relatively new drug court, developed six years ago with the mindset of treating drug addiction as an illness, rather than a crime.

“When you lock them up and throw away the key, all you’re doing is locking them up. All you’re doing is punishment. When they get out, they still have all the demons they may have. And, they usually go right back to what they were doing. We reward good behavior in terms of abstaining from drug use. But, we do have sanctions for the times our clients do fall off the wagon.”

The problem, Salinas said, is that his courtroom is constantly full.

But, he’s convinced that problem is also a solution.

“We have waiting lists left and right. But, we can’t expand, because our accommodations for substance abuse is critically low. If you have insurance and the financial means to get into Fairbanks or some other private location, that’s great. But, the clients we see in drug treatment court are usually low-income. Sometimes, they’re no income. And, really, we only have one viable residential option, and that’s Salvation Army (Harbor Light Center).”

Salinas believes that lack of options is keeping crime rates from going down, and may even be helping to drive them up.

“When you only have one facility that deals with a certain price range for a city of over 800,000 (people) plus, it’s just not cutting it,” he said. “Our approach works. If our clients aren’t getting high and don’t have the need to get high, then they’re not going to have the itch to go out and commit crimes. That also protects our community. But, we can only do so much with the access we have now. And, we’re pretty much maxed out.”

INCREASING ACCESS

At a meeting with Congresswoman Susan Brooks (R-Carmel) last month, local treatment providers said the lack of access options has to change. Expanded education on the options that are available is also critical, said others.

“There may be a need for more treatment programs. But, I think the first step is to make sure that people who need care know how to access care,” said Fairbanks Recovery Center Adult Services Director Robin Parsons.

Reaching out to those like Berry and Bex — part of a growing group of younger Hoosiers hooked on dangerous drugs like heroin — is a critical part of that link, Parsons added.

“We’re seeing people come in much sicker, much younger, in full blown opiate addiction in ages 18-25, which, we virtually didn’t see in the past. So, it’s a very, very scary epidemic,” she said.

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Fairbanks’ Hope Academy High School is getting increased attention as another potential unconventional solution. Since the program’s founding in 2004, 98 teens have seen their lives turned around. Last year’s class alone has already achieved a collective nearly 10 years of sobriety, and 70 percent are now heading to college.

For Brooks, a former federal prosecutor and criminal defense attorney who specialized in substance abuse cases, they are encouraging results.

“We need to replicate, I think, schools like this,” she told I-Team 8. “The first or second time a young person is arrested, they need treatment. And, we need to find those ways to help them. Because, at the end of the day, it will cost us less to educate and help these kids recover than it will be to incarcerate them.”

FSSA’s Addiction Services budget is already allocated for the 2015 fiscal year, and Brooks acknowledges federal grants for startup programs are tough to come by. But, she remains confident the issue will command new attention on Capitol Hill next session, because heroin use is up sharply nationwide.

Berry, and so many more young Hoosiers, will be watching, hoping those holding checkbooks are listening.

“I don’t want more people to die out there,” she said. “I want them to come and get help. It is frustrating, because (treatment) works if you want it to work. We have to give people that chance.”