Mike Papantonio. Law and Addiction. Waterside, 2019.

Law and Addiction should appeal to two different audiences. The reader might be able to guess whom from the title. The first audience is those who like legal thrillers. The author uses a tried and true technique out of Grisham: A young, idealistic, newly minted lawyer is challenged by a large, experienced, ruthless law firm or law firms.

The second audience would be made up of those who are interested in the opioid crisis. Recently we reviewed Spying on the South which describes the sad desolation in the environs of West Virginia caused by the decline of the coal industry and the rise of opioid addiction. This novel is set in West Virginia, and its purpose is not just to entertain but to raise awareness.

The main thesis of Law and Addiction notes that the opioid crisis is different from similar outbreaks of drug use in the past in the United States. This time the drugs are manufactured legally. If we are to believe this book, most of the drug makers and legal drug sellers do not keep track of drug sales.

At one point in a preliminary hearing, a top salesman for one of the companies is asked specifically how she could sell so many pills in areas of West Virginia which are so sparsely populated. Her response reminded me of the refrain from the Tom Lehrer song “Wernher von Braun,” satirizing the rocket scientist’s indifference to what his missiles were intended to do:

“Once the rockets are up, who cares where they come down?
That’s not my department!” says Wernher von Braun.

By the way, in Love and Addiction an older lawyer quotes from another Tom Lehrer classic. Of course, the young lawyer has never heard of Lehrer.

In the course of the story, the novel maintains that some of the drug manufacturers recommended to doctors a three-month regimen to manage pain when they knew that a month is all it would take to addict someone. Once they create another addict, then they can sell more drugs.

There is a potential flaw in this system. Because these drugs kill, eventually the drug companies will lose customers. However, by then the drug companies will have made their money. “Who cares where they come down?”

Law and Addiction follows a formulaic page turner similar to Grisham’s The Firm. Jake Rutledge is about to graduate from law school in West Virginia when his twin brother, Blake, dies from an opioid overdose. His hometown in the least populated county in the state is known as Zombieland. That tells us something of the effect drugs have had there.

As hinted already, Jake begins to understand that the opioid problem is different from other drug crises. Many times we think of someone illegally making heroin or cocaine and then smuggling it to North American or European countries and then dealers selling it. The whole process from start to finish is illegal.

Not so with opioids. The government regulates these drugs, so they are legally made and legally obtainable via prescription. The problems that come with this are mainly twofold: over-prescribing and the so-called pill mills. Once a person becomes dependent on them, he or she will try to find a cooperative doctor or pharmacist willing to make some extra dollars on the side. Failing that, they will turn to street drugs like heroin as a replacement.

Jake becomes convinced as he examines statistical evidence that not only do sometimes law enforcement people turn a blind eye to the problem but so have drug companies. As Jake, thinking of his brother, contacts larger firms that he thinks might be interested in helping him, he runs into some obstacles.

In my time as a law enforcement officer in the Coast Guard, I was only involved in one case that made it to court. It was an EPA pollution case, but I was asked to testify as an expert witness. Fortunately for me, I was never called to the stand.

However, one government witness who testified was a young man of twenty-four who had done some statistical analysis for the government agency he worked for. When the defense attorney cross-examined him, he began by asking in a drawn out, disdainful tone, “How old are you?”

The young man was completely rattled and never regained his composure. The prosecution did not stand a chance with that witness.

Law and Addiction reminded me of that. Jake is treated condescendingly by other lawyers until he comes across a partner in a fairly large firm in Huntington—an Ohio River port city—who takes him under his wing. Paul Vogel then contacts a nationally-known Florida Gulf Coast law firm and Nicholas “Deke” Deketomis takes over. It seems that, at least in novels, there are a number of high-rolling law firms from the Gulf Coast, whether Florida, Alabama, or Mississippi.

Judging from the author biography in the book, Deke Deketomis sounds like he may be based on the author himself or a composite from his law firm.

Besides some honorable and less honorable lawyers, the cast of characters includes law enforcement officers and elected officials, some of whom are on the take. The book introduces us to the so-called Hillbilly Mafia, an organization that began with moonshining and has survived by expanding into drugs, gambling, and other criminal activities in the Midwest. It now extends to a number of rust belt cities, but membership is based nearly solely on family ties.

What I have observed from different counties in the rural South, everyone knows which families are the moonshiners. It is almost always a family business, and there is trust and a certain honor among them. Even in this novel we see that people who are not “blood” are expendable.

Jake may be getting in over his head himself. Though his family has lived in the Mountain State for four generations, some locals see him as a troublemaker. Brother Blake’s onetime prom date, Anna, has herself become addicted, and Jake tries to help her as well. (It is far more complicated than that, but that is the abridged version).

As the discovery and investigation begins to implicate not only officers in some of the top pharmaceutical firms but government officials connected with the Hillbilly Mafia, Jake’s position becomes precarious. Without going into too much detail, the only thing keeping him alive is the conscience of a “good ol’ boy” who is Hillbilly Mafia.

Yes, this is an entertaining story, but there is a message behind it as well. It illustrates how the current drug crisis differs significantly from those in the past. After all, what can you do when at least the manufacture and some parts of the distribution chain are legal?