Here's the response to anybody who argues that terrorists and felons don't number among the millions of illegal aliens crossing our borders:

"CHEESE HEROIN TEMPTS TEXAS TEENS"
News Story by Jason Trahan
Wed May 16, 10:54 AM ET
from the website YAHOO NEWS


DALLAS, United States (AFP) - Sold in torn paper still bearing class notes, a cheap and deadly form of heroin called "cheese" is sweeping through northern Texas schools where it has claimed the lives of at least 21 teenagers.

At just two dollars a hit, the homemade blend of Mexican heroin and nighttime cold medicine has become dangerously popular among teens who don't even know what it is they are snorting, police say.

"A lot of kids we're catching haven't ever smoked a cigarette or drank alcohol," said Jeremy Liebbe, an investigator for the Dallas school district police who first identified cheese.

Kids as young as nine have been hooked on cheese, drug treatment facilities report. Most try it because of peer pressure, but some have told police that pushers force the drug on classmates through threats or worse.

Liebbe blames enterprising pushers for finding a new way to market their addictive wares to children.

Youths are reluctant to inject drugs with needles, he said, but don't seem afraid to snort a drug with a cutesy name that makes them feel lethargic, euphoric and disoriented.

Law enforcement officials say cheese appears to be limited to the Dallas area, but fear it could soon spread beyond the immediate suburbs, some of which are already reporting deaths.

Cheese first surfaced in 2005 and has disproportionately hit teens in Dallas's significant Hispanic community. Some believe that the traffickers bringing the heroin up from Mexico are simply selling in their own neighborhoods.

Overcoming the strong pull of addiction, as well as teenage ingenuity, has proven difficult.

Students smuggle the powder, usually wrapped in torn notebook paper often still bearing traces of old assignments, into school hidden in their underwear, socks, bags and wherever else they think they won't be searched.

If they're not caught by a dog trained to sniff out narcotics, or turned in by a snitch cooperating with authorities, students support their own habit by selling cheese to their friends. Many snort it in classrooms or bathrooms, or after school at parties with friends.

Most fatal overdose victims have died in their sleep after a night of partying, the youngest so far being 15. They are usually found dead by a sibling, or parent -- which was the case with 17-year-old Garrett Hill, of Dallas.

In January 2005, his mother, Cindy Hill, went to wake her son, who was sleeping on a couch after a night out with a friend.

She began to scream when she saw he was dead.

"We had so many talks about drugs," she said. "I was so shocked to find out that he had done heroin. I blame myself."

The heroin used to make cheese is brought into Dallas over the network of freeways branching up from the Mexican border 420 miles to the south. It's then sold by adult traffickers to teenage mixers, who sell to their friends.

In response to the crisis, Dallas school officials have organized public meetings in English and Spanish, distributed reams of bilingual warning flyers, stepped up unannounced searches by drug dogs, and trained teachers and counselors to be alert for signs of drug use.

"We're not sitting on our hands," said Jon Dahlander, spokesman for Dallas schools.

Local Hispanic leaders have implored Spanish-speaking families to tell their kids that cheese is heroin, and to get help for their children who are already addicted.

Many still opt to keep their child's addiction secret.

"They feel family services will take away their 10-year-old if they find out their 15-year-old is an addict," said Carlos Quintanilla, a Hispanic community activist helping cheese families.

He said he fears summer vacation, when kids will have less supervision and more time to gather with friends and probably experiment with drugs.

Without an extraordinary effort by parents, and an expansion of city recreational sports activities, "the potential for catastrophe is very high," he said.