JEFFERSONVILLE — When he was elected Harrison County Prosecutor in 2011, Otto Schalk hadn't seen a lot of heroin cases.
But a huge uptick in the number of people being prosecuted for — or dying from — heroin and opiates in the past two to three years in the county prompted Schalk to go beyond his traditional work as prosecutor to help his community.
Tuesday night in Jeffersonville, 'Hit of Hell,' a documentary on the reality of heroin and opiate use created by Schalk and local firm Digital IT, will be screened with discussion afterward. The event is free but registration is required.
The documentary was originally created with the intention of showing it to high school students — to reach young people before they get exposed to the drugs offers a better chance to stay away from it, he said.
“I'm a firm believer that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure,” Schalk said. “And I think that's especially true when it comes to drug prevention.”
The screenings and discussions — there have been several so far — are also aimed at helping teachers, who spend hours with the students each day, know the signs of trouble. But the original plan may have overshot the mark a bit.
“What we soon realized, though, is that by the time they get to high school, it's too late,” Schalk said.
He said that in Harrison County, like surrounding counties, heroin is found in high schools and pills — which often precedes heroin use — found in middle schools. The film has been shown to all middle- and high-schoolers in the county, and now Schalk is taking it on the road, screening for free to help spread the word of what these drugs can do.
And it's hit home with many.
“The response has been overwhelming,” he said. “There [have been] a lot of tears — from students, teachers, principals — it was important to me to highlight the reality ... these aren't strangers. These are kids that went to your high schools.
“Some of the students [in the documentary] that have died walked the halls with some of the students that were watching it.”
And this is what he intended with the creation of the film — living with heroin and opiate addiction isn't pretty and neither should the tools used to educate about it be.
“We wanted to make it emotional, we wanted to make it gripping, a kind of in-your-face documentary on what you can expect if you go down the path of heroin and opiate addiction,” he said. “And that's going to be a grave site.”
Since the film was finished in April, it's been watched online more than 35,000 times. Schalk said if this can save even one life, it is worth it.
Unlike other drugs, heroin and opiate abuse often begins in less insidious ways — making its way into homes first through legitimately gained prescription pills after medical procedures. When pills take hold and then become harder to come by, people may turn to heroin.
He tells of kids getting wisdom teeth pulled and getting a 60-day supply of “pretty serious painkiller,” he said.
“It's crazy to me,” Schalk said. “And we act surprised when we have someone that has no job, that's on Medicaid and the doctor overprescribes, we'd be naïve to think they're not going to sell those. And they're just pumping out into the market.
“What we see is that it's easier for a 16-year-old kid to get their hands on an oxycodone than it is a Budweiser. To me, that's a serious problem we need to address.”
That starts with educating young people, and holding community leaders responsible for helping to keep their towns safe.
“I think we have to hold some of our medical communities accountable,” he said, regarding overprescribing. “And I think our medical community has to hold themselves accountable.”
Schalk said that since he started in his role as prosecutor, there's been a major flip between methamphetamine use and opiates.
“I remember the first time I prosecuted heroin, I thought 'wow, that's a heavy, scary drug,'” he said. “We were used to seeing meth every day. By 2013, we were seeing [heroin and opiates] more and more and now it's the normal.”
Unlike other drugs, heroin and opiates transcend age, race, socioeconomic status and religion.
“That's what I'm trying to get these kids to understand,” he said. “This is not the lifestyle you want to choose. It's terrible — it's dirty, it's filthy, and you're not going to live. If you are on heroin, you're going to die or end up in prison for a long time.”
And Schalk doesn't want to see that happen. Although creating the documentary went beyond his prosecutorial responsibilities, it's in keeping with the duty Schalk feels to help protect the community.
“It's really heart-wrenching,” he said of the heroin epidemic. “I see these young kids and they keep dying. It's not a win for the state of Indiana when someone I'm prosecuting passes away and I see them in the obituary. That's a loss for us. My job, at the end of the day, is not to put people in prison. My job is to make sure people are productive members of society.”