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Regular readers might recall our recent post about a Canadian man who opened a brick-and-mortar store that sold heroin and cocaine in Vancouver because he wanted to give people access to clean drugs and challenge Canadian drug laws.

In a tragic twist, Jerry Martin, 51, died in Vancouver on Friday, a few days after he was hospitalised due to a suspected fentanyl overdose.

Although he survived the overdose initially, Martin remained unresponsive in hospital and his family eventually decided to take him off life support.

The story of Martin’s ‘drug store’ made worldwide headlines earlier this year. The poor guy was himself a recovering addict and part of the reason he wanted to open the controversial store was so that drug users had access to tested drugs, specifically drugs that were clean of fentanyl.

Martin’s store was however set upon by Canadian authorities shortly after opening its doors, and according to his sister, Martin relapsed soon after his arrest.

British Columbia is in the midst of a three-year pilot project decriminalising small amounts of drugs, but selling remains illegal. Martin’s shop, however, supplied ‘hardcore’ drugs, where Canadian authorities were trying to introduce pharmaceutical alternatives to street drugs with its programme.

“I am giving them addictive drugs but I’m giving them safer addictive drugs than you can get on the street, where they might be laced with fentanyl or some other drug.”

At the time of Martin’s arrest, Vancouver police said they supported harm reduction services but “drug trafficking will continue to be the subject of enforcement.”

Police also banned Martin from returning to the Downtown Eastside neighbourhood. Despite this, he was still planning to re-open a pop-up store one day.

“He was definitely self-sacrificing. He wanted to save lives.”

Martin himself wasn’t surprised at being shut down, but believes he was ‘breaking the mould’ and hoped ‘someone else might come in behind him and have more structure, process, resources, and be able to complete the job.’

 

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Those closest to him believed his intentions were pure, but he may have been overwhelmed by the reality of what his vision entailed.

It’s a sad ending to a troubled life.

[source:vice]