OWN TV Host Dr. Laura Berman sends a warning to parents of adolescents about the alarming and growing rate of deaths associated with opioids in America, a few days after she discovered her teenage son died of an apparent overdose.
Berman spoke to Fox News on Tuesday from her home in Santa Monica, California, where she found her son Samuel “Sammy” Berman Chapman dead on Sunday, nearly an hour after her husband, Samuel Chapman, delivered him lunch in his bedroom. Paramedics were unable to resuscitate the teenager, and information found at the scene shows that Sammy may have been in contact with a drug dealer in the Snapchat app. He presumably had an apparent overdose after taking Xanax or Percocet with fentanyl margins. Toxicology reports are still pending.
‘Like many adolescent children, especially boys, but also girls, who are full of hormones and feel immortal and infallible and are stuck at home, bored, stiff and trying to bond, [Sammy] done something stupid, ‘Berman recalls.
With the help of the Narcotics division of the Santa Monica Police Department, Berman and her husband, Samuel Chapman, try to sum up what happened. According to her, it appears from a screenshot of Sammy’s Snapchat account that he was in communication with a drug dealer who provided a ‘marketing page’ of drugs and prices. Berman said she believes the drug dealer delivered drugs to Sammy, but that her son did not intend to drink fentanyl.
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Dr. Laura Berman has revealed that she discovered her teenage son Sammy dead in her home. Sammy is believed to have died from an overdose.
(Valerie Macon / Getty Images)
“I know he did not know he was taking fentanyl. He was not interested in it; he was afraid of it. He does not understand addiction and unfortunately does not want to be addicted, but most American teens experiment in this fentanyl. “side presumably relatively innocent experimental drugs,” she said.
Berman said she and Chapman had an open dialogue with Sammy about drugs when they discovered cannabis use in the past. She said the couple did not encourage or allow it and watched him very closely. Berman and Chapman have two more sons: Jackson (15) and Ethan (23).
“Kids think, ‘Oh, I can only take it once and I will not get addicted’ or ‘I can try it once to see how it feels,’ because they do not know it’s going to kill them,” warned Berman. “They need to know that the retailers they meet are likely to provide fentanyl-edged products. It is very easy for everyone to overdose, but especially for a teenager. “
In her talks with authorities, Berman said she has now learned even more about how the opioid crisis in America was a “before COVID-19” pandemic.
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Dr. Laura Berman (left) with her son, Sammy, who passed away on Sunday at the age of 16.
(Photo courtesy of Samuel Chapman)
“We know it was a pandemic, but a silent one,” Berman shared. “It’s incredibly addictive and brain-destroying and life-threatening and almost impossible to beat. The level of deaths and suicides is even astronomical, just because of the pain of trying to become sober.”
The podcast host “Language of Love” said she had had 200 deaths within the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) school system in the past year, apparently due to an overdose of fentanyl. Her warning to parents, just like her, is to use her son’s death as a ‘teachable moment’.
“Do not think that your child is safe just because they are hiding in your home,” Berman said. “Even if your teen doesn’t really give you the credibility and listen to you, they care a lot about what happens to their peers. If they can relate to my son and see themselves in him and see what happened to him “Then use it. Use it to reach your children.”
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Berman said within hours of her death on Instagram that she was “overwhelmed” with “hundreds” of stories of similar parents whose children died from drug overdoses, especially counterfeit drugs.
Berman and her family’s approach to finding more answers about what was in Sammy’s system and how it’s multiple. In addition to becoming an advocate against the opioid pandemic one day, Berman said she believes big technology companies like Snapchat can do more.
“What we need is for Snapchat and Twitter and all the platforms to help the police find predators that are killing our children. Snapchat is very clear that they do not support drug trafficking, and I’m sure when their algorithm finds a page “To advertise drug trafficking, they take it down, but that does not stop the drug trafficker. They are like a slap in the face. They appear just seconds later with a new account,” she said.
Snapchat issued a statement on Monday in response to Sammy’s death.
Dr. Recalling her son’s ‘intellectual curiosity’, Laura Berman told Fox News he ‘loved business and science’.
(Photo courtesy of Samuel Chapman)
“Our deepest sympathy is with the family and friends of Samuel Berman Chapman and we are saddened by his passing,” a company spokesman said in a statement. “We are committed to cooperating with law enforcement in this case and in all cases where Snapchat is used for illegal purposes. We have no tolerance for using Snapchat to buy or sell illegal drugs.”
The spokesman said the company is constantly improving its ability to detect drug-related activities. However, Berman said authorities informed her that apps like Snapchat rarely help identify drug dealers. Instead, they just try to delete the account.
‘We have not heard of it yet [Snapchat.] Any parent blames themselves more than anything else. Snapchat did not deliver the drugs to my son’s door. ‘What I hold Snapchat responsible for is to catch the one who did it and those who do it to other children and parents across the country,’ she said.
Berman added: “I do not hold them responsible for his death, but I hold them responsible for his justice.”
A rep for Snapchat did not immediately respond to Fox News’ request for comment.
“Police officers say there is a result of this event. They are finding children dead everywhere and we were not the first to go through this tragedy,” the sad mother said.
Berman said her son died on her Instagram on Sunday. “My beautiful boy is gone. 16 years old. Home shelter,” she wrote on Instagram, along with a photo of her and her son embracing. “My heart is completely shattered and I’m not sure how I should keep breathing. I’m just placing it now so that not another child dies.”
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” A drug dealer contacted him on Snapchat and gave him fentinyl [sic] Xanax or Percocet tied up (toxicology will teach it) and he redone in his room. They do it because it concerns people even more and is good for business, but it causes overdose and the children do not know what they are taking, “her social media message continues.
Bill Bodner, the DEA special agent in charge in Los Angeles, told Fox 11 that what happened to Sammy is happening to other kids in the US.
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He said counterfeit pills printed on social media look just like real Xanax or other types of drugs, but they are usually fentanyl – which can be deadly.
“This is something that is manufactured in a dirty clandestine laboratory in Mexico. There is no quality control. The dosage is extremely contradictory. It only takes 2.5 mg of fentanyl to kill you,” Bodner told the station.
The host “In the Bedroom with Dr. Laura Berman” added that the pandemic increases the pressure and tribulation that children across the country face when they are at home, outside of school due to the coronavirus pandemic rather than at school with their peer group. They are communicating more and more on social media, she says.
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Berman, who remembered the good points of Fox News, Sammy, the love of science and the eagerness to go to university and travel Europe, said she finally decided to talk about raising awareness.
“I felt just as helpless and full of anger on top of the sadness. I just thought I was going to put it on my people because if I could save one child tonight, it would be worth it,” she concluded.
Fox News’ David Aaro contributed to this report.