Doug Thorburn on Early-Stage Alcohol and Drug Addiction

Some close friend. She lies, steals, manipulates…Oh, does that sound familiar?

July 10, 2009 at 10:29 pm · Filed under 3 - Dear Doug...

Daughter abuse Thief with infant needs consequences—for the sake of the baby Dear Doug: A close friend lets her infant son play with toys she puts in the bottom of her grocery cart taken from the store while shopping. She “forgets” to pay for these items. I’ve warned her about this, but she hasn’t been caught. In addition, she and her husband are maxing out their credit cards on jewelry, sporting events and fancy dinners intending to file for bankruptcy. I had to take a second job to make ends meet and pay all of my bills. I’m jealous. What should I do? Signed, Envious . . . . . Dear Codependent, Other columnists would rightly suggest you drop her as a friend because she is a cheat ...

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A gift from God, even if only for a year.

July 10, 2009 at 10:27 pm · Filed under 3 - Dear Doug...

Dear Doug, My 44-year-old husband of 19 years died of cancer only a few months ago. While he was kind, funny and talented, he was also an alcoholic. The last year of his life was the best because he got sober and focused on our relationship. My husband’s family is dysfunctional and disconnected from each other. Except for his mother, he wasn’t close to any of them. Though she’s kind and sensitive, she’s anxious and depressed. She is divorced from my father-in-law, who is also an alcoholic. Time heals, and I no longer have the deep-rooted grief that his family still has. I’m trying to move on with my life. How do I tell the in-laws that their grief is a downer and ...

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A discussion of Ohio’s DUI plates is replete with myths. Let’s clarify.

July 10, 2009 at 10:26 pm · Filed under 4 - Alcoholic Myth of the Month

“I don’t believe that alcohol makes you dangerous unless you are [at] the point [where] you are seeing double, or passed out.” “Have two beers and [you are] considered intoxicated.” “5-6 drinks doesn’t make you a danger.” So said various comments responding to a Beacon Journal column on the statistical failure of DUI plates (affectionately known as “party plates”) in Ohio, which are special license plates intended to notify other drivers and authorities that the car being driven was involved in an arrest for DUI. I wouldn’t bother addressing these myths of alcoholism, since I’ve covered them in one form or another elsewhere in my books (especially in Alcoholism Myths and Realities and Get Out of the Way! How to Identify ...

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The seemingly crazy mayoral candidate should be given the benefit of the doubt, just like other “crazy” people.

July 10, 2009 at 10:22 pm · Filed under 5 - Amazing Alcoholic Antics

Alcoholic Antic-of-the-Month Story from “This is True” by Randy Cassingham, with his “tagline:” “MORE CHICKEN GOODNESS: A Kentucky Fried Chicken store in St. Petersburg, Fla., called police to report a customer would not leave. When served his eight-piece chicken meal, Paul Congemi, 52, allegedly screamed "That's not my [expletive] food!", cursed employees, and then, when an employee started laughing at him, really got mad. When officers confronted Congemi, he reportedly told them, "Don't touch me. I am running for mayor, and once I get elected you will be fired." Sure enough, Congemi is a candidate for the office. When one officer asked him to step outside, Congemi replied, "I don't like you. You gave me a ticket." Officers gave him a warning, ...

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James W. Von Brunn: alcoholic rage can take form in heinous behaviors, even in an octogenarian.

June 23, 2009 at 2:15 pm · Filed under 1 - Top Stories

James W. Von Brunn, Racist Octogenarian—and Alcoholic In Drunks, Drugs & Debits, I explained that the addicted ego can impel the addict to degrade, defile and ridicule others in an effort to build himself up. Sometimes this devolves into hatred, which can be directed against entire classes of people, as in racism or bigotry. I surmised that while not all racists and bigots are addicts, probably most are. Former Black Panther Eldridge Cleaver recanted his idea of a war between races only after he got sober. Former Governor George Wallace died “not drinking” with huge support among Blacks, who formerly had been the target of his racial epithets. Adolf Hitler was an amphetamine and barbiturate addict. As mentioned in How to ...

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Jesse James Hollywood goes on trial. Also: terrorists, a Playboy playmate, Norman Hsu and Phil Spector

June 23, 2009 at 2:13 pm · Filed under 1 - Top Stories

Runners-up for top story of the month: Jesse James Hollywood, accused of ordering the murder of 15-year-old Nicholas Markowitz in 2000 and finally standing trial in a Santa Barbara, California courtroom. In a classic case replete with addicts, Hollywood allegedly kidnapped Markowitz in August, 2000, in revenge over a $1,200 drug debt owed by his older half-brother, Ben Markowitz. According to prosecutors, after learning from his family’s lawyer that kidnapping can carry a life sentence, Hollywood gave his friend Ryan Hoyt a gun and car and told him to drive to Santa Barbara and “take care of business.” Hoyt was convicted of being the shooter and sentenced to death for the murder. In a truly bizarre case of distorted perceptions or ...

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Behavioral indications of alcoholism rear ugly in a con man, two cops, a former judge–and a school teacher

June 23, 2009 at 2:11 pm · Filed under 1 - Top Stories

Under watch: In an early 2009 piece on white collar crime, The Economist magazine mentioned something those who have read my books would predict: “Many [Club Fed and other white collar] prisoners suddenly discover, post-conviction, that they had a drinking problem….” With this in mind, these are stories for which the evidence of alcoholism is in the behaviors themselves, even though absolute proof in public sources may be lacking. James William Lull, who failed to show up for sentencing in court in Hawaii after being convicted of scamming more than 50 investors out of $30 million in a Ponzi scheme because his car ripped through a barbed-wire fence and plunged 200 feet down a canyon, killing him. Lull, 60, while manager at ...

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Potential victims of Kim Jong Il and, now, Kim Jong Un: the entire human race

June 23, 2009 at 2:09 pm · Filed under 1 - Top Stories

Alcoholic victims of the month: The rest of the human race apart from North Korea’s Kim Jong Il and his son Kim Jong Un, who has been anointed the next leader of the totalitarian socialist state by the elder Kim. Un is said to be competitive, proficient in English and, oh yes, a “heavy drinker” just like his alcoholic father. No wonder, according to Kim’s former Sushi chef Kenji Fujimoto, Un “acts just like his father and is [his] favorite.” As I wrote in the October 2004 TAR, the most dangerous people alive are alcoholic despots, especially those with access to weapons of mass destruction. Unfortunately, addicts are capable of anything (and I mean anything). North Korea just tested another nuclear ...

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The San Francisco Zoo, victim of alcoholic financial abuse

June 23, 2009 at 2:08 pm · Filed under 1 - Top Stories

Co-dependents of the month: The San Francisco Zoo, which settled a lawsuit with two brothers who survived the Christmas Day 2007 tiger attack after they and their friend Carlos Sousa, Jr. taunted the tiger, reported in the January-February 2008 TAR. Carlos was killed, but Paul and Kulbir Dhaliwal, in whose car an empty bottle of vodka was found after the attack, are said to have raked in a cool $900,000. “Other” escapades, reported in the September-October 2008 issue of TAR, included several counts of felony shoplifting and imprisonment for violation of probation involving a high-speed chase for Paul and public drunkenness and resisting arrest for Kulbir. Most lotto winners run through their take within a few years; the addictionologist in me ...

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“Alpha Dog”: excellent portrayal of hard-core adolescent addicts and the Jesse James Hollywood story

June 23, 2009 at 2:07 pm · Filed under 2 - Movie & Book Reviews

“Alpha Dog” – superb portrayal of adolescent poly-drug addicts One critic described “Alpha Dog,” Nick Cassavetes’ thinly disguised story of the murder of 15-year-old Nicholas Markowitz for which Jesse James Hollywood is on trial, as a “glossy yet unflinching portrait of violent, hedonistic teenagers.” Johnny Truelove’s (Jesse James Hollywood’s) chain-smoking father Sonny (played by Bruce Willis) suggested “it’s all about parenting,” which is what Cassavetes suggested in several interviews. These are typical takes on a film that is, at its core, really about adolescent poly-drug addiction. The film is, at first, very difficult to watch. It is filled to the brim with profanities, tattoos, boozing, drugging, violence, screaming, reckless driving and addicts’ confabulations. The codependent (and probably alcoholic) parents are crazed, yet ...

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Dear Doug: What do a raging daughter, a 15-year-old party girl and a 45-year-old committing elder abuse have in common?

June 23, 2009 at 2:02 pm · Filed under 3 - Dear Doug...

Daughter abuse Dear Doug: Last year our family attended a large party given by my daughter and son-in-law. Having previously borne the brunt of my daughter’s violent temper, we hesitated to stay overnight—but did. Big mistake. The next morning, the swearing and raging at her father left him in tears. There was no contact between them until I received a long email from my daughter almost begging for a sign from her father that he wants her in his life. I forwarded the email to my husband and, hoping this was an opening for renewed contact, he called her. She immediately went into a rant about how he has ruined her life and slammed the phone in his ear. He was devastated. I’ve suggested ...

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Just what are we squeamish about?

June 23, 2009 at 1:59 pm · Filed under 4 - Alcoholic Myth of the Month

Myth of the Month: "We’re all squeamish about mental illness.” “It’s the psychiatric issues,” “it has to do with their distorted thinking and depression,” and “more than three-fourths of the offenders in 30 murder-suicides in the Cleveland, Ohio, area had signs of mental illness.” So reported a CNN.com article, “’Hopeless dads kill their families out of love,” on the recent spate of murder-suicides by family members, in its attempt to explain why familicide occurs. Cari Wheat, whose father Curt Wheat shot his wife, Marie, as she slept in their bedroom and then killed himself in 2003 explained, “We’re all squeamish about mental illness.” She believes her father pulled the trigger “out of a sense of love for her mother.” While an old ...

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I often tell those dealing with addicts, “Don’t argue. You never know what might hit you.”

June 23, 2009 at 1:57 pm · Filed under 5 - Amazing Alcoholic Antics

Alcoholic Antic-of-the-Month Story from “This is True” by Randy Cassingham, with his “tagline:” "RIGHT IN THE TOOL OF HIS TRADE: Lawyer Louis Brunoforte was having a beer at the Chic-A-Boom Room (no, really!) in Dunedin, Fla. When he came back from the restroom, a woman was sitting in his chair looking through her purse. He waited until she looked up. "She asked me if I had a problem," Brunoforte said. "I said, 'I'm just waiting for you to finish so I can sit in my chair.' She said, 'Oh, it's your chair? Has it been your chair forever?'" She then cursed him, so he cursed her back, and that's when the woman hit the 6-foot-tall, 240-pound attorney. "She cold-cocked me right in ...

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White collar criminals, like other crooks, are usually alcoholics. A cite from The Economist magazine supports the idea that this litany of Ponzi-like con artists and politicians are no different: they all exhibit egomania, which is usually rooted in alcoholism.

May 23, 2009 at 12:34 pm · Filed under 1 - Top Stories

In a recent piece on white-collar crime, The Economist magazine observed that “many [Club Fed and other white-collar] prisoners suddenly discover, post-conviction, that they had a drinking problem….” This should come as no surprise to our audience. In Drunks, Drugs & Debits: How to Recognize Addicts and Avoid Financial Abuse, I argue that 80-90% of criminals, including those who perpetrate white-collar crime, are addicts. Students of my books know how to use this simple idea to protect themselves from the financial devastation wrought by addicts. However, try proving the existence of alcoholism when it is so often hidden by both addicts and their enablers. As I wrote in the Top Story on Los Angeles City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo and his wife ...

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Horrific abusers and killers are almost always psychotropic drug addicts. A few unknowns, and Phil Spector finally getting what he deserved.

May 23, 2009 at 12:28 pm · Filed under 1 - Top Stories

Runners-up for top story of the month: Lindolfo Thibes, sentenced to 109 years-to-life for sexually assaulting his daughter beginning when she was 6 years old and ultimately fathering her three children. What began as a domestic violence assault in a Las Vegas hospital parking lot in 2005, in which Thibes reportedly stabbed his “girlfriend,” ended up revealing a harrowing tale, in which the girl was found to be his daughter. He monitored her every move for over two decades using surveillance cameras and home imprisonment. He beat her fiercely during paranoid rages. The unnamed daughter, now 29, told authorities he plied her with alcohol and marijuana from the age of 8. While Thibes rambled off a litany of complaints to the ...

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