August 15, 2013
Thursday PM

Dear Editor,

My heart breaks for Cody and Kathy Evans as they are going through the grieving process of losing their wonderful son Jessie. He was a very nice person and this whole situation is mind boggling.

When my brother Kenneth Ecker committed suicide in 2007, I was asking much of the same questions, WHY? I never did get a answer. How do we help our family recover from such a tragedy such as this? How do we protect our children from drug dealers?

Another family member has been involved with drugs and as hard as I had fought to get him the help he needed the system fought even harder to shut doors in my face. Now that he is an adult with medical issues, it now is impossible to get him the help he needs.

Our community is great at banding together and educating our children about drugs and other things, but we really fall down when it comes to helping the ones who are already hooked.

I agree with Kathy and Cody there needs to be an investigation into the death of their son Jessie. From the sounds of things and all the rumors that are surfacing around town, there should be a more thorough investigation.

There seems to be a rash of young people committing suicide as of late and they seem to be drug related. WAKE UP POWERS TO BE AND PAY ATTENTION!!! I know there is a drug task force in Ketchikan, and I know you are doing a lot but it not enough. We have to get tougher and more aggressive and let these drug dealers know as a community we will not tolerate them selling or bringing their junk into our town.

Sally Balch
Ketchikan, Alaska

About: "Mother of three children, The oldest of two brothers and two sisters."

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