The New York Times has offered up its own gut-wrenching tale of the death of Brandy French. She's the Beaver County girl, all of 16, who died after ingesting Ecstasy, the "hip," mind-bending designer drug of choice these days, at the Post-Gazette Pavilion last May.
Greg Ludwig, 19, is accused of selling three pills at $20 a pop to a friend, who then gave one to another friend, who then gave it to Brandy. He faces a charge of third-degree murder.
"Ten months after (Brandy) died of an overdose … law enforcement officials here and Brandy's father, Don French, are now beginning to formally apportion blame," begins The Times story written by Sara Rimer.
Well, what about Brandy?
Mr. French "is about to file a negligence lawsuit against some of the people who were with his daughter the night she became fatally ill from the drug at a rock concert … . He is not looking for revenge or money, Mr. French says, but accountability."
Well, what about Brandy?
John Gismondi, the French family's lawyer, has "filed a notification of his intent to sue with the insurance company of the mother whose house Brandy's friends took her to after the concert and who waited several hours, until after Brandy had stopped breathing, to call for medical help."
Well, what about Brandy?
"Mr. Gismondi says he will also sue several of Brandy's friends and acquaintances, who were at the house, for failing to get help," The Times account continues.
Well, what about Brandy?
"The Ecstasy was Michele's idea," Michele Maranuk, 17, the girl who bought what turned out to be "double-dose" pills from Mr. Ludwig and then shared them with Paula Wilson, 18, who, in turn, shared one with Brandy, according to testimony at a coroner's inquest.
Well, what about Brandy?
Brandy took the first half of her Ecstasy pill at about 4 p.m. on May 18, on the last full day of her short life at the "X-Fest," a daylong alternative rock festival at the former Star Lake Amphitheatre.
She was drunk, her friends told the mother of Lewis Hopkins, 16, to whose Belle Acres home her friends eventually would take Brandy after she had taken the second half of the pill, had been vomiting — violently and repeatedly — and could not satisfy an unquenchable drug- and alcohol-induced thirst.
The Times reports that Brandy fell out of bed that night. And she stopped breathing. For how long, nobody really knows. Ms. Wilson, however, performed CPR and Brandy started to breathe again. Mrs. Hopkins washed Brandy's face and applied some Vicks to her chest, reporter Rimer recounts.
It was just after midnight when those in the Hopkins home decided a trip to the hospital was necessary. They got Brandy into a car. She stopped breathing again. More CPR. Paramedics were called. She was taken to Allegheny General Hospital.
Brandy French died later that day — May 19, 2001 — at AGH. An autopsy confirmed the Ecstasy overdose. Coroner Cyril H. Wecht said the drug, formally known as methylenedioxy-methamphetamine, made it difficult for Brandy to breathe. That, in turn, shut down her central nervous system and caused irreversible brain damage. The water that she was devouring also may have contributed to her death, Dr. Wecht said, backing up in her lungs and further encumbering her breathing.
But, said Wecht, "Had she received prompt medical intervention, there was a reasonable medical certainty that she would have survived."
There's also a reasonable medical certainty that Brandy would have survived "X-Fest," seen May 20, turned 17, become a junior at Ambridge High School, and maybe even realized her dream of someday opening a beauty salon had she not gotten drunk and not taken Ecstasy for the first time that turned out to be her last.
But, but, but, she was pressured to take the drug and be a part of the "in-crowd," some of you intimately familiar with the case likely are shouting at this page about now. Oh, the peer pressure is horrid these days; she was a VICTIM, you say. And on top of all of that, Brandy had lost her mother to brain cancer 11 months before.
Indeed, the death of a parent at such a tender age can be devastating. I know that first hand. And indeed, the peer pressure on teen-agers these days is monumental. I know this first hand, too, having a 16-year-old daughter with 16-year-old peers driving fancy sports cars, spending most every weekend on the slopes of Seven Springs and sporting ensembles of clothing that seldom are worn twice in the same month. And I'm sure she's been tempted by drugs and alcohol.
And, yes, Brandy was a victim. But she was a victim of herself , a victim of her own irresponsibility.
Brandy French didn't die because her mom died.
Brandy French didn't die because her father relented and allowed her to go to her first, and last, rock concert.
Brandy French didn't die because Greg Ludwig sold one of her friends three Ecstasy pills.
Brandy French didn't die because Michele Maranuk shared the Ecstasy with Paula Wilson.
Brandy French didn't die because Wilson shared the Ecstasy with her.
Brandy French didn't die because friends put her to bed.
Brandy French didn't die because the CPR she was administered didn't "take."
Brandy French didn't die because friends and the mother of one of those friends failed to act quickly enough to get her life-saving medical treatment.
Brandy French didn't die because the good physicians and nurses at AGH couldn't save her.
No, Brandy French died because she made a stupid decision.
She died because she got drunk.
She died because she chose to swallow a powerful drug and for a use not intended by its makers.
And she paid the ultimate price. Her life.
Having a daughter the same age as Brandy French, I can't help but have great empathy for her family. The void in Don French's life I can't even begin to imagine. And I extend my sincerest condolences on his loss.
Would I be just as livid as French, lashing out in any and every way I could to hold those "responsible" "accountable"⢠I can't answer that question; I may share the same general style of shoes, so to speak, but I don't wear his.
I do know, however, as 19th century English scientist and philosopher Sir Francis Galton once reminded, that the vast majority of this race we call humans has a natural tendency to shrink from the responsibility of standing and acting alone. It's a difficult enough philosophy for mature adults to understand and execute, let alone maturing teen-agers, I'll grant you.
But shrink we cannot, for the consequences of standing with the crowd and acting in unison with it can, as Brandy French's case mortally attests, be deadly.
If Don French is looking for somebody to "blame," as difficult as it will be, he needs to blame Brandy first.
