It’s sad to see when a public servant with a great career gets caught up in the world of drugs, and not just drugs but outright addiction. It’s a tragedy when addiction can flip someone’s life upside down and ruin just about everything for them. In this case it is about an Ontario police officer who was the youngest ever cadet on the Toronto police force at only 17 years of age. Officer Peter Moore had a distinguished career as a cop, but when he became addicted to prescription painkillers his life was changed for ever and he may as well have been shooting up heroin due to the severity of his opioid addiction. Officer Moore’s lowest point was perhaps when he bought illegal medications of an informant who was a well know drug dealer. That is perhaps the absolute low for Officer Moore who described his actions as “That’s as bad as it gets”.
Officer Moore acknowledges that he did not have a good career, he had an excellent one because of his quick progression through the ranks as a cop. He was a detective constable before the age of 30 and even worked in the tactical division as well as the police force’s intelligence unit. Things turned sour very quickly after a terrible car accident that left Officer Moore in rough shape with an injured back that had already been a problem for him in the past. But due to his devotion to the police force, and with yet another promotion on the way, he ignored the pain and returned to work just two weeks following the accident. In his mind he believed he could simply get through the pain as he didn’t believe it was that serious. Unfortunately he was wrong. The pain intensified to a level that required him to take two Percocets a day because of his doctor’s concerns. Sadly that number multiplied to 18 pills per day very quickly and eventually turned into a full blown addiction that he simply couldn’t handle on his own. He voluntarily checked himself into one of Canada’s top rehabilitation centers where he was treated with methadone which was an ordeal that was truly a difficult and trying experience for him. His methadone treatment lasted about a week and upon leaving the facility he promptly returned to work. Sadly he continued to abuse prescription medications in order to deal with the pain he was still experiencing after two failed back surgeries. Due to this he landed himself back into rehab, this time for 30 days. He was off the percocet now and he was completely off painkillers until his doctor was introduced to a new a new drug called OxyContin. His doctor assured him that this new drug was slow-release, and therefore could not lead to addiction, but Officer Moore discovered that if you bit down on the pill the effects were felt much sooner, and he quickly spiraled out of control once again. Officer Moore began using his badge as a means to get multiple prescriptions around the province until one doctor caught on and informed the police department about Moore’s sketchy drug seeking behavior.
Officer Moore was never suspended or fired due to his actions, but decided to leave the police force in the late 1990s. For several years he continued to use methadone to treat his pain and was eventually helped by a doctor who specialized in anesthesia.
The main part to take away from this story is that pain is a real problem for many people, and the drugs available are available for a reason, but the tragedy is the number of people becoming addicted and never addressing their main concern which is pain. If the source of pain is identified and treated effectively then the possibility of addiction goes away. Not everyone’s pain can be treated promptly or even years down the road, and that is perhaps the saddest part of addiction because it’s nearly impossible to manage certain kinds of pain without the drugs, no matter how much rehab or therapy is available.
