Submitted by: MrsJames | View Member Profile | View Other Posts
Created: 8/3/2005
Editor's Note: We allow our members to post articles expressing their beliefs and opinions.The views expressed in articles on this website may, or may not be, shared by us. -- The management.
[Editor's Note: So many of these types of things are mere hoaxes, but this one, sadly is true. http://www.snopes.com/toxins/dustoff.asp]
Dust Off (or a variant of the product) is available everywhere
there's a computer.
First I'm going to tell you a little about me and my family.
My name is Jeff. I am a Police Officer for a city which is known nationwide for its crime rate. We have a lot of gangs and drugs.
At one point we were # 2 in the nation in homicides per capita. I also have a police K-9 named Thor. He was certified in drugs and general duty. He retired at 3 years old because he was shot in the line of duty. He lives with us
now and I still train with him because he likes it. I always liked the fact that
there was no way to bring drugs into my house. Thor wouldn't allow it.
He would tell on you. The reason I say this is so you understand that I know about drugs. I have taught in schools about drugs. My wife
asks our kids at least once a week if they used any drugs. Makes them
promise they wont. I like building computers occasionally and started building a new one in
February 2005. I also was working on some of my older computers.
They were full of dust so on one of my trips to the computer store I bought 3 pack of DUST OFF. Dust Off is a can of compressed air to blow dust off a computer. A few weeks later when I went to use one of them they were all used. I talked to my kids and my two sons both said they had used them on their computer and messing around with them. I yelled at
them for wasting the 10 dollars I paid for them. On February 28 I
went back to the computer store. They didn't have the 3 pack which I had
bought on sale so I bought a single jumbo can of Dust Off. I went home and
set it down beside my computer.
On March 1st, I left for work at 10 PM. Just before midnight my wife
went down and kissed Kyle goodnight. At 5:30 am the next morning Kathy
went downstairs to wake Kyle up for school, before she left for work.
He was propped up in bed with his legs crossed and his head leaning over.
She called to him a few times to get up. He didn't move. He
would sometimes tease her like this and pretend he fell back asleep.
He was never easy to get up. She went in and shook his arm. He fell
over. He was pale white and had the straw from the Dust Off can coming
out of his mouth. He had the new can of Dust Off in his hands. Kyle was
dead.
I am a police officer and I had never heard of this. My wife is a nurse
and she had never heard of this. We later found out from the
coroner, after the autopsy, that only the propellant from the can of Dust
off was in his system. No other drugs. Kyle had died between midnight
and 1 AM.
I found out that using Dust Off is being done mostly by kids
ages 9 through 15. They even have a name for it. It's called dusting. A
take off from the Dust Off name. It gives them a slight high for
about 10 seconds. It makes them dizzy. A boy who lives down the street
from us showed Kyle how to do this about a month before. Kyle showed his
best friend. Told him it was cool and it couldn't hurt you. Its just compressed air. It can't hurt you. His best friend said no.
Kyle was wrong. It's not just compressed air. It also contains a
propellant called R2. Its a refrigerant like what is used in your
refrigerator. It is a heavy gas. Heavier than air. When you
inhale it, it fills your lungs and keeps the good air, with oxygen, out.
That's why you feel dizzy, buzzed. It decreases the oxygen to your
brain, to your heart. Kyle was right. It can't hurt you. IT
KILLS YOU.
The horrible part about this is there is no warning. There is no level
that kills you. It's not cumulative or an overdose; it can just go
randomly, terribly wrong. Roll the dice and if your number comes up
you die. IT'S NOT AN OVERDOSE. It's Russian Roulette. You don't die
later.
Or not feel good and say I've had too much. You usually die as
you're breathing it in. If not, you die within 2 seconds of finishing
"the hit." That's why the straw was still in Kyle's mouth when he
died. That's why his eyes were still open.
The experts want to call this huffing. The kids don't believe it's
huffing. As adults we tend to lump many things together. But it doesn't
fit here. And that's why it's more accepted. There is no
chemical reaction. no strong odor. It doesn't follow the huffing signals. Kyle
complained a few days before he died of his tongue hurting. It
probably did. The propellant causes frostbite. If I had only known.
It's easy to say hey, it's my life and I'll do what I want. But
it isn't. Others are always effected. This has forever changed our family's
life. I have a hole in my heart and soul that can never be
fixed. The pain is so immense I can't describe it. There's
nowhere to run from it. I cry all the time and I don't ever cry. I do what
I'm supposed to do but I don't really care. My kids are messed up.
One won't talk about it. The other will only sleep in our room at night.
And my wife, I can't even describe how bad she is taking this. I
thought we were safe because of Thor. I thought we were safe because we
knew about drugs and talked to our kids about them.
After Kyle died another story came out. A Probation Officer went
to the school system next to ours to speak with a student. While there
he found a student using Dust Off in the bathroom. This student told him
about another student who also had some in his locker. This is a
rather affluent school system. They will tell you they don't have a
drug problem there. They don't even have a dare or plus program
there. So rather than tell everyone about this "new" way of getting high
they found, they hid it. The probation officer told the media after
Kyle's death and they, the school, then admitted to it. I know that if
they would have told the media and I had heard, it wouldn't have been
in my house.
We need to get this out of our homes and school computer labs.
Using Dust Off isn't new and some "professionals" do know about It
just isn't talked about much, except by the kids. They all seem to know
about it.
April 2nd was 1 month since Kyle died. April 5th would have been
his 15th birthday. And every weekday I catch myself sitting on the
livingroom couch at 2:30 in the afternoon and waiting to see him get off the
bus. I know Kyle is in heaven but I can't help but wonder
If I died and went to Hell.
Dale
This officer is asking people to make this as well known as possible so please People warn your kids, have them warn their friends.
