Fatal Facts of Fentanyl
The Fatal Facts of Fentanyl is dedicated to raising awareness of the illicit fentanyl crisis hitting the USA. It is killing tens-of-thousands of people who suffer from substance abuse disorders and first-time users.
There are no boundaries. It is straight across the board with the number of deaths without any regard to race, sex, socio-economics, age, education, religious background, location. It is in every community within our country.
The fentanyl crisis is deadlier than ever before for various reasons. It is time to address the many issues surrounding this crisis. It is time to listen and learn from experts. It is time to hear the many stories from people who have lost their loved ones due to death by deception.
Change begins with each of us as individuals and collaboration with others towards this positive transformation. The goal is to save lives and families from this travesty.
Awareness and Education are the key.
Knowledge is Power.
Fatal Facts of Fentanyl
One and Done ~ Snapchat Dealers
Interview with Jaime Puerta, president of VOID, Victims Of Illicit Drugs, in particular Illicit Fentanyl bombarding our country with hundreds-of-thousands of deaths of our youth and young adults. Jaime is a grieving father who lost his 16-year old son, Daniel when he ingested a counterfeit pill that he purchased on SNAPCHAT, full of deadly Fentanyl that killed him.
Death by Deception!
Since, his son's death, Jaime has worked tirelessly in bringing awareness and education about the social media threat to all children, and for advocating for more common sense laws concerning Illicit Fentanyl trafficking.
WARNING TO ALL PARENTS... Fentanyl is killing at record levels and now Illicit Fentanyl is not only in counterfeit pills... but, now showing up in vaping products. One and Done counterfeit pills and now vaping products can be DEADLY if laced with Fentanyl!
Listen and Learn with factual and firsthand knowledge of this most deadly and potent drug!
VOID Victims Of Illicit Drugs
Nonprofit Organization
VOID was formed to bring to the public’s attention, through education, awareness and legislative advocacy, the immediate danger of sudden death associated with the use of illicit drugs, in particular FENTANYL, and other emerging synthetic analogs.
https://stopthevoid.org/
Click the above link to watch...
DEAD ON ARRIVAL - Documentary of Illicit Fentanyl
https://www.foxnews.com/.../fentanyl-more-accessible-kids...
The deadly drug has been found in vape pens on high school campuses in recent months
The Fatal Facts of Fentanyl podcast is dedicated to raising Awareness to the illicit FENTANYL crisis hitting the USA.
The goal is to SAVE LIVES and families from this travesty.
Awareness and Education are the Key.
Knowledge is Power!
Welcome to the year 2022. I am your host, lisa Carroll, for the Fatal Facts of Fentanyl podcast to bring you factual information for awareness and education to the illicit fentanyl crisis in America. My hope and motivation is to save lives and spare loved ones a similar grief of losing someone to this most potent and deadly drug being infiltrated into our country at alarming and escalating rates, causing hundreds of thousands of deaths with projected increasing numbers. This has got to stop. This has got to stop. After taking a break during the month of December, anticipating the first holiday season without my son who lost his life to illicit fentanyl poisoning, I did a lot of soul searching and I am being led to continue to interview experts and other grieving parents to share their stories with factual and firsthand knowledge of this lethal drug. We all share the common bond and are a part of a nationwide coalition to bring awareness and education with positive and much needed change. Please pass this podcast forward. You never know whose life you might save.
Speaker 1:I welcome my next guest, jaime Porta. Jaime is a Marine Corps veteran and small business owner in California. He has been featured on national TV and a part of this coalition to bring awareness and education towards positive changes. He is a grieving father dedicated to fight this fight, all for the love and honor for his beloved son, daniel. Daniel lost his life at age 16 by ingesting an illicit fentanyl counterfeit pill that he purchased on Snapchat. Since his son's untimely death, jaime has worked tirelessly in bringing awareness about the social media threat to all children and young adults in this country and advocating for more common sense laws concerning fentanyl trafficking. He is also the president of Victims Against Illicit Drugs, which stands for VOID.
Speaker 1:Void was formed to bring public attention through education, awareness and legislative advocacy, to the immediate danger of sudden death associated with the use of illicit drugs, in particular, fentanyl and other emerging synthetic analogs. Void speaks on behalf of their loved ones who have been taken and can no longer speak for themselves. Thank you for sharing. Thank you for sharing, jaime. I know, as a grieving parent myself, what have you learned now that you wish you knew then? Number one can you tell me first about Daniel and your story, please?
Speaker 2:Well, first and foremost, thank you so much for having me on your podcast. I truly appreciate it. I think you're doing a wonderful job in spreading awareness and education as well, on the scourge that's plaguing our communities. My son, daniel Joseph Huerta, on March 31st, during the pandemic, decided to reach out to a drug dealer on Snapchat, purchased what he thought was a blue M30 oxycodone pill. That pill was delivered half a block from our home. He came home that night and, after walking the dog and picking up that pill without my knowledge, obviously and we had dinner and we had a wonderful night full of laughs and and it was a jovial night. It was fantastic. We had a great time that night.
Speaker 2:And on April the 1st, the next morning, at approximately 8 o'clock in the morning, I walked into his room and I thought he was dead. You know it was something that no parent should ever have to see. You know it was something that no parent should ever have to see is I've seen death before and and I pretty much thought my son was gone, and so we called 9-1-1 and they came and tried to revive him. They took him to Henry Mayo Hospital here in Santa Clarita, california, here in Santa Clarita California, and from there he was transferred to Los Angeles Children's Hospital, where he was kept alive until his biological mother and I decided to withdraw all life-saving mechanisms and the technology that they were using to keep him alive. He was brain dead. They told us that there was absolutely nothing that they could do to bring him back, and so his mother, denise, and I decided to basically withdraw these life-saving mechanisms and he passed away on April, the 6th of 2020, at exactly 5.08 in the afternoon in the afternoon.
Speaker 1:It takes my breath away. I can't imagine just this the whole pain involved in all of that. I am so sorry. I know that you have worked tirelessly, like I mentioned before, on educating people about illicit fentanyl and sharing yours and Daniel's story and your family's story. What have you learned about? You mentioned that he purchased this counterfeit pill on Snapchat. What have you learned about social media platforms and if you can educate our audience about exactly what Snapchat does and what happens on Snapchat, with dealers grooming children like your son, daniel, who was just 16 years old. If you can elaborate on that for our audience please.
Speaker 2:Well, what I can tell you is that Snapchat purports that they are a camera company. They are everything but a camera company. If you look at the logo from Snapchat, it's a ghost. And what do ghosts do? Ghosts disappear. So one of the features of having that social media app is that the conversations that you have with your loved ones or with your friends in your settings, you can make those conversations disappear and have no track record or record of it, of what was the discussion taking place. And what that does is it opens up like a can of worms. It opens up, you know, the ability for nefarious actors to reach out to your loved ones, your children, and that you, as a parent, you absolutely have no idea of what they're doing on this.
Speaker 2:Now, snapchat's target market is our children between the ages of 13 and 17 years of age. They have lots of filters that they like to play with. It's supposed to be all fun and games, but what I have learned is that drug dealers abound on this platform, and what's happened is is that you know this isn't 1992 or 1993 or 1994, where before, if you wanted to buy drugs, you would reach out to your local drug dealer, whoever that may be, and you go and you buy weed or cocaine or whatever you're going to buy. But, like everything else in this world, commerce has gone from brick and mortar buildings to e-commerce platforms and social media platforms like Snapchat, instagram, facebook, tiktok. And what's happening is, you know, on these smartphones, these children have these apps and they're able to connect with drug dealers who actually deliver the drugs to their home or to half a block away from your home without your knowledge and it's you know.
Speaker 2:We have all of these drug deaths in the United States due to fentanyl poisoning that have just doubled year after year after year, and you have all of the experts sitting here scratching their heads wondering what the hell is going on. Why is this happening? Well, one of the biggest reasons why it's happening is the propagation of these drug deaths is due to children using social media platforms like Snapchat, excuse me and they get these drugs delivered to them and they die. They die because they have no idea that what they are consuming is a counterfeit opioid, most likely pressed south of the border or here in the United States, a pill made to look like and mimic a pharmaceutical-grade pill or a pharmaceutically trademarked pill that you would receive from your local pharmacy, like a Walgreens or a CVS, when in all reality it's a counterfeit pill made of some kind of binder and fentanyl and you die.
Speaker 1:It's alarming. I mean, you're not the only parent that I've spoken to about this and you and I know several stories like this which are true stories. We're not making this up. There's no conspiracy theories here. These are all factual stories from parents like yourself who have lost their children to these counterfeit pills and have been groomed on Snapchat especially and you mentioned Snapchat. It's like encrypted, encrypted all the information is encrypted, like it disappears, like you said. So that's actually a haven for drug dealers. I mean, you know, because it's hard to catch them, it's hard to search them for evidence, things like that. Okay and so, about the social media platforms I know you and I spoke about and I think it's important to bring awareness to this, especially to parents. Do you know about the DEA recent release of all the emojis that are related to drug drugs, illicit drugs in this country and how they communicate with children on these platforms with the emojis? What can you tell parents to be aware of this, to look for?
Speaker 2:Well, one of the things that we have been fighting for and that I think is very, very important. Like the executives at Snapchat state that children who are using their apps have the right to privacy, which is just insane to see what their children are doing with their social media apps like Snapchat, but Snapchat does not allow these apps to work or to function because, again, concerns of privacy. So this is a huge fight that we have. Dr Laura Berman and Sam Chapman you should interview them one day. They are heading with a federal bill called Sammy's Law. They lost their 17-year-old son, sammy, last year, I believe in March, and they're heading with a law called Sammy's Law, which would permit apps like Bark or Life360 to monitor what your children are doing on the social media apps like Snapchat. Now Snapchat, in answer to that, have come out and said that they have come up with their own app, their own monitoring app for parents, but it would only allow parents to see who your children are having conversations with, but it does not give the parents the content of those conversations. And I'm not only talking about drug dealing. I'm talking about all kinds of nefarious activities that happen on these apps. I had a mother from Santa Clarita, california, where I live, call me three weeks ago. She knows the fight that I'm in and she forwarded me these pictures of a grown man who was sending pictures of his private parts to her 14-year-old daughter. Okay, it is absolutely heinous. You know that this is going on on these social media platforms and all in fact you know the thing is is that these social media apps they will claim protections of Section 230C, claim protections of Section 230C.
Speaker 2:So if we talk about Section 230C, section 230C was a law written in 1996, before the explosion of internet. Internet had come out, of course, but we weren't. The writers of the law could never have envisioned where internet would be today, in 2022. So when they wrote this law, it was made to protect free speech. But what exactly you know, are you protected from? I mean? If so, what they didn't envision is that internet platforms would grow so big and become the behemoths that they have. We know for a fact that you know, due to these platforms we know of, they claim any ways of election integrity. They talk about so many other things as well. You know that is protected.
Speaker 2:But anyways, what I want to get back to is that section two. If you walk into a grocery store and you slip and fall, you can hold that supermarket liable for not keeping you safe, right. So if you slip and fall in a puddle of water, you know they have a duty of care that they must they must respect. It's the same thing that we're doing for Section 230C. What we are asking is that Section 230C be amended with the provision a duty of care provision which would basically force all of these social media platforms to police themselves, make sure that they get rid of all the drug dealers that are on these platforms. And not only that, lisa, but it would allow parents nationwide to bring a lawsuit against the media platform, the social media platform, and at least have your case listened to by your peers and a judge, and then have that judge and peers decide if you have a case or not.
Speaker 2:Because, as it is right now, thousands upon thousands of parents who have lost their children due to fentanyl poisoning, knowing that their child attained that pill or that lethal counterfeit pill through a social media app like Snapchat, there is absolutely nothing that could be done in today's day and age to hold Snapchat accountable for the death of that child. And that's what we need to change. We have to start the fight right there, and parents are getting angry and we have lots of partners and we've talked about it. Congress is talking about it right now. We have a long ways to go. I know that there's the will to wanting to do it, but unfortunately, being that we live in a country that is so divided, right now they want to do reforms to Section 230C for all the wrong reasons. I believe, and I really do believe, that the answer to all of this madness and this craziness that's going on in the social media apps again is to insert a duty of care provision into the law of Section 230C.
Speaker 1:Yes, sir, what I've read about Section 230 a couple of years ago actually was to me it's a way to protect the high tech companies and what you're talking about to write in that provision definitely needs to be done to protect families and children, especially in this country. And you mentioned the sex. There is sex trafficking. That goes on. There's drug trafficking they go hand in hand. And as far as the rights for children, we have rights as their parents to protect them. And you know it comes down to what is right. We need to do what's right in this country instead of protecting what is wrong in this country, and I think you can understand that and probably agree with me.
Speaker 2:I would agree with you 100%. When I first found out, when I felt that my son had dabbled with marijuana for the first time, when I felt that my son had dabbled with marijuana for the first time, I actually had him tested by our health care provider here in California. And when I asked for the results of that urine test, they refused to give it to me due to HIPAA concerns. And I said well, wait a minute. Who is paying for the health insurance? I'm paying for the health insurance, I am the father, he is the child. I have a right to see the urine analysis and they would not give them to me unless he signed off on it. Absolute madness.
Speaker 1:Absolute madness. I went through the same thing with my son too. I got so angry. Yes, sir, I went through the same thing and here they are leaving these life and death situations to. My son was older, by the way, but because of the HIPAA laws and because of the privacy, they're leaving this decision a major decision, life or death decision is his hands instead of the parent who is paying for it, and it is. It's absurd, it's insane. It is absolutely just a big deterrent in this country for parents to save their children and we generally care and love our children and that is a big deterrent in our society and I've heard this from so many parents and it is. It's not logical, it's just not logical. We could go on and on about that and there's definitely changes that need to be made with that.
Speaker 1:Let's talk about these emojis, how kids communicate. I know I had to look at these. I looked it up and some of them are quite obvious. There's leaves, a branch with leaves on it that obviously means weed, okay. There's a dragon I had to look that up. That means heroin. There's a mushroom that means magic mushrooms. I mean, there's so many emojis that they communicate with and it's almost like think it's a code. It's a code between and then there's combinations of emojis that dealers communicate with the kids and the kids communicate with their friends. And parents need to wake up, I'm sorry. It's right there, blatantly in front of your face, and they just want, they just tend to ignore it. What can you? Let's talk about also the analogs. You talked about analogs being cut into all drugs and these counterfeit pills. It's not just solicit fentanyl, it's the analogs of this. What do you know about the analogs like carfentanil and all the other ones?
Speaker 2:Well, drug dealers are always trying to. These chemists are always trying to switch up the chemistry of the fentanyl in and of itself, due to the fact that there are some laws out there that target some of these things or do not target enough of them, so they play with them. I'll be very frank with you, though I've not I've not, I've only heard of one case of a young victim dying due to the ingestion of carfentanil. Most of them, if not all of them, have just been due to illicit fentanyl. The analogs that are coming up and there's more things coming down the pipeline, you know, let's not forget that these drug dealers and these chemists, they are very, very savvy. They need to be changing the recipes all the time because they're looking for the best or the best high that they can give their clients without trying to kill them, which is something completely different. But the analogs I really have not heard that much about them. We're starting to hear about cannabis being laced with marijuana, though we haven't had any definitive proof of that. I was on the Fox News show the other night where they were talking about vapes with fentanyl in it. I have not really heard a lot about that either.
Speaker 2:From what I understand, it may be the kids themselves or somebody putting fentanyl in the vapes, but any way you look at it, right now we are looking at widespread death in this nation. We're in not for fentanyl. All of these kids would still be alive. I almost feel bad for this generation of children, lisa, because you know, I mean, I was no angel when I was a kid. Yeah, I smoked pot and things like that, but at least you know I could go home and sleep it off and the next day be OK. This generation of children doesn't even have the luxury of even experimenting with drugs, because it can be one and done dangerous things out there. The analogs, the licit fentanyl you just don't know. You're playing Russian roulette with a loaded gun and it's very unfortunate, and the kids are dying left and right. You know, and then you have, I don't know. It's just madness right now. It's just crazy.
Speaker 2:I think that the only way that we're going to be able to slow the death rates down in the United States is only through education and awareness. I don't believe that we're going to arrest our way out of it, as much as I would like that. I think that the messaging needs to be in every single school and colleges across this nation. I don't know if you know this or not, but there was a documentary, a 21-minute documentary, called Dead on Arrival, and we were in that documentary, and I'm saying this, by the way, everything that I do does not come from a base of ego or anything like that. Everything that I do is because I'm trying to avert as many deaths as possible in this country. So believe me when I'm telling you this is that I have been told, and so have my partners, is that Dead on Arrival, this video, has been a success, whereas being used in high schools and giving that message.
Speaker 1:I love Dead on Arrival. That is a wonderful. I think it's the best documentary that I've seen. The person who did it was Dominic right.
Speaker 2:That's correct.
Speaker 1:The director's name is Dominic it is the best one I've ever seen and it's very highly educational and it deals with the facts, and kids and parents in schools, whatever need to deal with the facts of this. And that's what we're all trying to do is just bring awareness and education. None of us make money from this. I mean, that's not our motive at all. We're just trying to. I feel like we're being led. I know we're being led. Everyone I've ever interviewed, including yourself. We're on this mission to just bring awareness and education to save lives, to save other young people's lives, and to bring factual information to parents to what to look for in schools. I know that to be true. I know that definitely. You know we talked about vaping. I did. I want to thank you. You actually got me motivated to get back in the saddle with this podcast because it takes an emotional toll on me and as a person, I can tell you honestly, listening to story after story after story and it gets very, you know, sad, so sad. At times I had to back away. But listening to you and Derek Maltz on Fox the other night talk about this, it just really motivated me and I know has led to interview you. So thank you so much.
Speaker 1:But let's talk about vaping. There was a time I really thought vapes, vapes are not good by any means. Whether you're vaping, you know, the nicotine is high, high levels of nicotine. If you're vaping in the pot, the weed high levels of THC. Parents need to be aware of this and I have looked into this. Somebody with a government agency actually informed me about vaping a couple of months ago and what they do is they can take the liquid out of the vape and they can put anything in there.
Speaker 1:And, yes, we've got to be open. We've got to open our minds about the different ways of manufacturing, distributing and ways of ingesting illicit fentanyl. And, of course, it would not surprise me if vaping is one of those ways that kids are doing and they don't know what they're ingesting. It's quite easy for fentanyl illicit fentanyl to be put in a vape by somebody. The recent stories about vaping came out of South Carolina, connecticut, new Mexico. That is the ones that I've, I've, I've listened to and it's very probable that that has happened. No doubt, if it can happen in a counterfeit pill that people wouldn't have believed a couple of years ago and it's happened, killing people it can certainly be put in a vape product and it can be deadly and definitely laced with fentanyl. What do you feel about that?
Speaker 2:Well, you know, if you look at vape, um, vaping, um, for example, companies like Juul you know that made these bubble gum flavors and the cotton candy flavors and they made it all you know, very cool, quote unquote to vape. And it's really an epidemic, also in high schools where we have kids vaping left and right. I can't even imagine what would happen if it became a vast way of introducing fentanyl into the market through vapes, because let's look at it this way, we know that there is no quality control at all when they make the counterfeit bills. It's like the chocolate chip cookie analog. One chocolate chip will have maybe two chips of chocolate, another one might have six. The one that has six you're going to die. So how are they going to do that with the vapes I have?
Speaker 2:Again, I have not heard widespread use of it. They are starting to come out and there's some reports out there. I pray to God that this does not heard widespread use of it. They are starting to come out and there's some reports out there. I pray to God that this does not become widespread because if it does, I can't even imagine the amount of deaths that are going to happen in this nation due to the fact that vaping is very popular amongst teens. And not only that, but it's just so, so, so addicting as well, so I can't even fathom what would happen.
Speaker 1:You know, jaime, I can't either, but I want you to think about this. We couldn't fathom the counterfeit pills. That happened a couple of years ago. We weren't aware of that either. So I think it is important for us to open up to the possibilities and that it could very well happen Because, like you said, these dealers, these drug people, are very slick, they're very streetwise, they know what they're doing. Also, a lot of people don't they're not aware that fentanyl is cheaper to manufacture than, say, heroin. They're making a ton of money.
Speaker 1:This is a multi-billion dollar industry that we are paying the expense for. We are losing hundreds of thousands of children and young adults in this country. When is it going to stop? What do we need to do? I mean, you and I probably know some of the answers to this and like to see what's going to be done. But I want to elaborate, because I know one thing that you and your group are doing, and let's talk about the details of the upcoming rally at Snapchat headquarters. I know it's going to be in Santa Monica, california, this Friday, january 21st, at 12 noon Pacific time. Let's elaborate on that and educate our audience about that and share the details of that.
Speaker 2:Well, we had had a meeting with Snapchat in April of 2021. Myself and 17 other families were. Three executives of Snapchat were on the call, on the Zoom call, and they basically had acted like they didn't know that it had become such a widespread problem. But we know that drug dealing on Snapchat is probably as early as 2017, 2018 was happening, but nothing was being done about it due to the fact that they didn't want to do anything about it. You know, if you, if you, were to bring that kind of attention that your, your app, is killing children, they don't want anything to do about it. And you know, a lot of parents got together. We got tired of it. We needed to bring awareness to it and when we did that rally in June of 2021, a lot of media showed up. The local media, local Fox News channel showed up, ktla, a bunch of news organizations showed up, and then that opened up the national conversation. Then we were invited onto the national shows and people wanted to learn more about it.
Speaker 2:Due to the stigma of addiction and overdose, when you hear of a kid dying, most people think, or most families think, well, that's never going to happen to my kid, because we don't have that problem in our family. We don't have recreational drug users in our family. We don't have people who are addicted to drugs in our family. Well, guess what? They're on Snapchat. They're bored in a pandemic. They want to spread their wings per se, they want to experiment. They go onto this platform and they die.
Speaker 2:Now they said that they have done many algorithm changes, so they're trying to kick people off of their platform. Excuse me, but we still know that children are still dying today. So what we've done is we've come up with a transparency act. What we're asking of Snapchat is that they're saying that they've launched all these algorithms, that they've kicked off thousands upon thousands upon thousands of drug dealers off of their platform, that they have these PSAs on there so children can see them to make sure that they do not buy drugs on their platform, but we feel that that, I think, is just a lot of fluff.
Speaker 2:What we've asked for is a transparency committee a committee made up of retired law enforcement lawmakers, teachers and bereaved parents who have lost their children to be able to audit their efforts. We want to know exactly what they're doing, in what timely manner, for example, if law enforcement submits a subpoena to Snapchat to get the whole Snapchat conversation between a drug dealer and a kid. It shouldn't take over a year to get the whole Snapchat conversation between a drug dealer and a kid. It shouldn't take over a year to get that record, like I did. It took over a year for my detective to get that record. Why did it take so long?
Speaker 1:You would think somebody would want to help with that investigation.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. And while this whole year went by, how many more drugs were sold by that drug dealer to other unsuspecting children? How many more died? So you know, that's just one of the issues. We want a turnaround time of anywhere between 24 to 48 hours if it's warranted, you know, to get the Snapchat conversation. Not only that, we don't only want the drug dealer taken off of the platform, we want a criminal referral of that drug dealer to the local law enforcement agency where that drug dealer is at, and we want them stopped, we want them arrested.
Speaker 2:You know, I think by doing small measures like that and then we can make sure that it's happening, then maybe we'll slow down the drug deaths. That and, along with the provision of care that we talked to, the duty of care provision that we wanted inserted in Section 230C, I think that we'll be able to do that. And the only way that we're going to be able to get this done is when families come together and voice their anger and their frustrations at a behemoth, a company worth $100 billion. You know, you had Evan Spiegel on a Yahoo article like three months ago, talking about his $100 million home that he bought in Homeby Hills, a home that's not even finished, by the way, worth $100 million. And you have all of these parents with their dead children, with a behemoth like Snapchat that is not doing nearly enough to stop the deaths of their children. And we know that we can't bring back our kids, but can at least can we try to save more children from falling in the hands of an unscrupulous actor on Snapchat, buying what he's thinking is a pharmaceutical grade pill, only to consume a counterfeit and die. So we want transparency, we want to know what they're doing. We want we want real results in a timely manner. We want the subpoenas answered in a timely manner. We want criminal referrals in a timely manner, and the only way we can do that is by voicing our, you know, lifting our voices together in unison at this company and see if we can get it done.
Speaker 2:We there was. They got a lot of you know they. There was a lot of warranted how should I say this? There was a lot of warranted. They did not expect the media to look at them now with a microscope. Since then, they've been up on the Capitol steps, they've been in hearings in the Senate, they've been in Congress. They've been grilled by both Democrats and Republicans wanting transparency from them. I don't think they ever expected that and that wouldn't have happened.
Speaker 1:And I'm not giving myself credit, lisa, I'm telling you it's a lot of Well, you're part of a coalition and I can a lot of. Well, you're part of a coalition and I can give you credit. Okay, you're part of a coalition across this country and y'all have done some great things the last several years, and I know what your motivation is, and I'm going to ask you what motivates you, what is your hope?
Speaker 2:You're going to make me cry, that's okay.
Speaker 2:You're being real. My motivation is my son. My motivation is your son, lisa. My motivation are the alex's of the world, of the jessicas of uh, of the jonathans of you know. There are just so many kids that I know in pictures that they should be here. They should be here right now, but they're not due to failed policy failures, due to failures of our laws. As far as Section 230 C goes. There's a lot that motivates me, but at night, when I put my leg, my, I lay my head on the pillow, I asked myself did you do enough today? Did you do enough? And? And that's hard and it's hard because sometimes we feel like we're we're fighting a losing battle.
Speaker 2:But again, education awareness is key. I invite everybody to go on to wwwstopthevoidorg. You can find our documentary there. There are absolutely no copyrights to that documentary, so it can be shared wide, it can be shared in schools, it can be shared in any way you want. You do not need our permission to use it. And we're going to keep fighting and we're going to keep going at this. We're going to keep bringing the pressure on Snapchat every single day and we're going to try to hold our legislators accountable. Here in California, unfortunately, we have a very, very progressive state where there are no punitive measures possible to get passed in our local Senate and Assembly. Here it's impossible. So the only way we feel that we can slow these deaths down is by education and awareness.
Speaker 1:Well, I'm going to tell you too. I live in the South and the same thing's happening here, it's happening in the Northeast, it's happening across this country and it's going to take. You know, I kind of get angry about this, but I've got to step back from that anger and resentment. Why do grieving parents have to be the ones pushing this, to bring any public health awareness to this country? Why? I don't have the answer to that. All I know is we've got to do it. We've got to do it. If we don't do it, it's not going to get done. And there's also it's also people like our friend, derek Maltz. He has gotten everybody on national news to talk about this and it has come a long way and it's going to continue 2022. It's going to continue and we are going to fight the fight and motivate each other and keep the positivity, because we all have a common goal and that is to bring awareness and education and spare other families this grief and to save young people's lives. It's as simple as that. As simple as that.
Speaker 2:There are a lot of groups working in this space of fentanyl awareness. I could go. I have a long list of them. They are all in their own space, but they are all working in conjunction of trying to do something about this problem. It's almost I may be presumptuous of me to say maybe like the Civil Rights Act or the Civil Rights Movement in the United States, where it took a generation of people to get up and say this is not right, this is wrong. What is going on, this needs change, and they got the change and we got the change that we needed. It's the same thing here.
Speaker 1:It's the same exact thing. I totally agree with you. I read something today about with Martin Luther King, his speech. I read it and it's the same. I could totally empathize and you can too. It's the same type of mission. It's the same type of call.
Speaker 1:It's because this is wrong. What is going on, this is just totally wrong. It's evil and it's up to people to change it, and we do. We're up against the wall, we do have a fight, but we're doing it for the common good and I know that to be true. And I mean I can't thank you enough. You're a true warrior and thank you for everything that you have done and continue to do for this cause.
Speaker 1:I want to especially thank you for sharing your beautiful son Daniel's story with us and your family story, and I just my hope is for people just to empathize and to open their minds and their hearts and their souls to this. This is so important. It's wiping out a generation of people. That's not exaggerating, and it's up to all of us, as individuals and as groups, to try to change this. And, jaime, just God bless you and your loved ones on this grief journey. I just can't thank you enough and I really do appreciate it. And I'm going to ask you one more thing. If there's one thing you can tell parents, what would that thing be?
Speaker 2:If you are paying for your child's phone, you have a right to monitor what they're doing on that phone, and if they don't want you to do it, then you take the phone away.
Speaker 1:Exactly, and I think too, though you mentioned one time if parents think this can't happen to them, what do you say to that?
Speaker 2:If you think it can't happen to you, look at my family, look at your family and look at the video clips of hundreds of thousands of families across this nation that are going through the same unimaginable loss, tragic loss of their children. And we were all caught with our pants down. We had absolutely no idea of the proliferation of illicit fentanyl in this country, the proliferation of counterfeit opioids made to mimic or look exactly like pharmaceutical-grade pills, which these kids like doing because they think there's a magic elixir in them, not knowing that it could take their own lives. If you think that it can happen to you, think again. Do your research, Monitor your child's phone, for God's sakes. If they don't like it, take it away from them and just be very, very, very vigilant.
Speaker 1:That's all I can say thank you and I appreciate your candidness and I appreciate your honesty and everything you're saying is so true and genuine and thank you and I hope I hope people listen. I truly do. Anyway, thank you, we'll have to do this again. Good luck with the rally this friday.
Speaker 2:I can't wait to see it and watch it and hear all about it and um we will be meeting at clover park in santa monica, california, at 11 30 in the morning and from there we're going to walk up to the headquarters. But everything's going to start out at about 11 30 in the morning at Clover Park in Santa Monica, california. Even if you have not lost a child and you would like to help us spread awareness, please be there. We would love to have you there. There's going to be some important speakers there, there's going to be a lot of media there and we say this in all in, you know, just trying to educate the public and bringing awareness to this scourge that is plaguing our communities. And thank you for having me on.
Speaker 1:Thank you.
Speaker 2:Glad you got motivated to do me the first of the year or, you know, your first one this year.
Speaker 1:Hey you and Derek motivated me. Thank you, I appreciate it so much. But anyway, thank you and God bless you. Okay, take care. Thank you.
