Late one night in June 1988, Geri Bemister smashed in the door of a Victoria pharmacy with a hammer and bolt cutters, grabbed the drugs she knew she could sell, and ran.

She was 19, an alcoholic, an addict and already entrenched with criminals when that smash-and-grab landed her in a federal prison. It only increased her street credibility and fuelled her fascination with the gang lifestyle. That, in turn, fuelled her addiction, which nearly claimed her life at 35.

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At that point, her family intervened and got her into rehab. From there, she went on to university as a student and then a teacher.

Her novel path makes her a uniquely qualified criminology instructor, behavioural scientist and addictions counsellor. And while it’s hard not to describe her path as inspiring and extraordinary, Bemister rejects that description. “I’m not proud of many things I did in my life,” she said. “I don’t ever want to be that person again.”

She thinks about the people to whom she sold drugs, especially a single mother with two children and a crack addiction.

“I was her fence. I’d give her a list of things to steal and she’d deliver them in exchange for drugs. She was a daily customer for the better part of three years. How would I make amends to her kids for what happened to them?” she asked. “I like to think I’m doing that by educating law-enforcement officers.”

As for her addiction, the 49-year-old is matter-of-fact. “I have a disease that is out to kill me. My medication is about living the best life I can and being the best person I can be.”

So, every morning, she wakes up and makes her bed. It’s her daily reminder that every choice made is either another step forward or one step back.

Growing up in Langford, Geri Bemister’s life was outwardly a happy one. She excelled at sports, was offered a scholarship to the University of Idaho, and was part of a large, extended family.

Both her parents worked hard and owned businesses. They and other family members smoked some pot, but there were also shadows of alcoholism — and something darker.

From age six until her early teens, Bemister says, she was sexually abused by three trusted adult, male family members.

“I didn’t have any idea that what was happening was wrong or bad,” Bemister said recently. “I had a fear of getting caught, but I never had any inclination to tell someone. I internalized it.”

It stopped only after she had a confrontation with one of her abusers when she was in her mid-teens. But by then, Bemister was an alcoholic and a daily user of drugs, including cocaine, acid, mushrooms and marijuana.

It wasn’t long before she quit school, lost the chance of the college scholarship and began supporting herself in Victoria by selling drugs. “My socialization was marred and scarred by abuse, so my default position is to feel I’m being victimized and to numb out,” she said.

The trauma still informs her decision-making and struggles with self-esteem. Bemister knows that both genetics and environmental factors contribute to the complex, chronic and often fatal brain disease called addiction.

That toxic combination led her to the underworld, where she thrived on the excitement and desperately wanted to be noticed and admired.

Her solo pharmacy robbery went as planned. She was in, out and gone before police arrived. She buried half the pills to sell later, then called a guy who promised to connect her with Vancouver dealers. She stole a car, loaded the pills into the trunk and headed to a ferry bound for Tsawwassen.

Although she had never done pharmaceuticals, she was “popping them like candy.” She blacked out and rear-ended a car. In the back seat, the dealer — with a gun tucked into his waistband — was passed out, having sampled the merchandise. Within minutes, police surrounded the stolen car.

Bemister remembers flashing lights and being ordered out of the car. She remembers flailing, screaming, swearing and eventually assaulting one of the officers, biting his ear. Then blackness.

Three days later and charged with 16 criminal offences, she was still vomiting up undigested pills as sheriffs helped her up the stairs to the Delta courtroom. She pleaded guilty, then swore at the judge, who refused to accept her plea. When she was deemed incapable of making a plea, the judge entering a not-guilty plea on her behalf. Bemister was sent without bail to the notorious and decrepit Oakalla Prison.

Under suicide watch in what was known as the “bug ward,” she was in and out of consciousness for nine days, sick, ranting and striking anyone who came near.

When she was finally coherent, Bemister couldn’t get anyone to believe that she’d planned and executed the robbery. Her parents, two lawyers, police and the judge were convinced she’d been a pawn of the guy in the back seat of the car she’d stolen. They all urged her to plead not guilty.

Bemister spent six weeks in Oakalla. After she was sexually assaulted, she was desperate to get out and took a plea deal on lesser charges.

Instead of doing more time in prison, Bemister moved back to Victoria and back to the gangs and selling drugs.

She remains angry that she had to lie. Good police work would have backed her guilty plea, she said. Had they asked about the rest of the pills, they would quickly have realized she was the only one who knew.

She got waitressing jobs downtown to get around her bail conditions that she stay away from there. In addition to her legitimate jobs, she found houses where gang members stashed the women working as escorts, and delivered and sold drugs.

“I became one of the largest dealers in Victoria. I was 20 and it’s like I had the Mr. T starter kit with the clothes, boats and motorcycles. … I even rode my Harley into a bar one night,” she said.

“I was a pretty angry person and now I was using to oblivion — alcohol, coke, marijuana and anything else every day. But I was ‘only’ ingesting [not injecting], so I felt I was fine. Injecting was the line in the sand for me and I thought I wasn’t selling to people using needles, so that was OK, too.”

Again, Bemister questions why police never investigated to find out how she could afford all of that.

By the mid-1990s, Bemister was married to a man 22 years older than her and had two stepdaughters. He was abusive, but their final break came only after their Saturna Island home — a grow-op complete with a cache of guns — burned to the ground.

At 27, the breakup overwhelmed her. She broke down and disclosed her childhood abuse to her parents and sister and filed a police report. The men were never charged, although one admitted to it and helped pay for her counselling.

She moved to Burnaby and started working at a bar linked to the Hells Angels. By now, Bemister and her addictions were out of control. She blabbed about what went on after hours and even dealt drugs behind the bar.

“My behaviour was super, super risky. I could easily have been found dead under a bridge.”

Despite all that, Bemister was awarded sole custody of her 11-year-old stepdaughter. Bemister was a terrible mother, leaving the girl alone at home, driving under the influence with her in the car, dealing drugs and bringing petty thieves and gangsters into their home. Her stepdaughter wisely left.

Bemister’s life spiralled down. To pay for crack, she cut down street signs and sold them for scrap. “I had no idea I was dying. But I was getting ill every time I had alcohol.”

Bemister’s organs were shutting down. After she went nine days without eating or showering, her mother and sister arrived and slapped a pencil and paper down on the kitchen table. “Write the guest list for your funeral,” they told her. “We think you’re dying. We want you to get better.”

They put a brochure for a residential addictions treatment centre on the table and left.

When her dirty housecoat fell open, Bemister saw that her ribs stuck out. Addled with drugs and alcohol, she thought it would be like a spa visit, and that three weeks later she’d be out partying and celebrating her 35th birthday. With her family paying the cost, Bemister agreed to go.

It took meeting other inmates for her to realize that it wasn’t a spa, she wasn’t OK and she needed to change.

Her description of the other inmates sounds like a hoary joke. There was a cop, a judge and a priest.

“My resiliency is born from abuse,” Bemister said.

“I decided if I’m going to do this, I’m going to do this perfectly right. I’m going to become the poster child for recovery.”

She chose abstinence over drug replacement therapy. For her, not being tied to any drugs means that “there is no ceiling on my life.” She declined methadone to get her through detox.

Almost 15 years later, Bemister has never relapsed and never taken anything more potent than Tylenol or Advil.

After three months of residential care, Bemister walked out. Two days later, she started as a freshman at Vancouver Island University, where she is now a sessional lecturer in the criminology faculty. Years of addiction and trauma left their marks. She struggles with short-term recall and finds it difficult to read for long periods without falling asleep.

Still, Bemister excelled, winning a scholarship in her first year and going on to do a master’s degree in criminology and behavioural science at the University of the Fraser Valley. While she was there, she applied for and received a federal pardon.

“I had only one brush with the law and I was able to evade the law for the rest of the time. That wasn’t right. It’s why I advocate for change in the justice system,” she said.

Police need better training, she said. Inmates, 85 per cent of whom are addicts, ought to be offered a choice between jail and residential treatment, including electronic monitoring to keep them in place.

Both inside and outside jails, and even in the midst of the fentanyl overdose crisis, Bemister argues for less emphasis on harm reduction and improved access to treatment and recovery programs.

She also advocates better child-protection laws and more support for victims of child sexual abuse.

In addition to teaching criminology at Vancouver Island University and North Island College, Bemister is on the recovery committee at the B.C. Centre for Substance Use, owns a consulting business, is a certified therapist and has been featured on the TV documentary series Interventions Canada.

Without the slightest hint of irony, Bemister acknowledges what she’s accomplished.

“I was always taught that I could do anything.”