Emily Ligawiec has to sign in visitors to the recovery program she attends in a grand Victorian house in Holyoke, Mass. She can't bring people to her room. She only recently earned phone and car privileges.

"We get 24, 48, 72-hour passes every weekend," she said.

But Ligawiec doesn't mind the restrictions. The 29-year-old is grateful she's alive to follow them, after a decade of addiction — first to prescription painkillers, then pills she bought in the street, then heroin.

"I had gone down a pretty dark path," she said.

What finally turned her around was a 911 call last winter.

She had gotten high on heroin and stolen her mother's car. When she returned it a few hours later, Officer Jon Cacela of Ware, Mass., was waiting in the driveway.

In the past, Cacela might have immediately read Ligawiec her rights, "because for the longest time, the whole idea was — arrest, arrest," he said.

Instead, he tapped on the car window and assured her she wasn't in trouble.

"I closed the window on him a couple of times and then I opened it a crack. Like, 'what do you want?'" Ligaweic said. "And he stood there patiently and said, 'I'm here to help you. I want to help you.' And I would roll up my window and look the other way."

Through the glass, Cacela explained he's part of a new partnership between police and public health — known in his county as the Drug Addiction Recovery Team (DART).

Although Ligaweic wasn't ready to talk that day, "he came back to my house again and again and again." When she pretended to be out, he would leave his card. "He did that three times because I kept losing it."

Cacela is used to rejection. He was the first in his town's police department to get trained in this type of outreach, which has been adopted in about 150 Massachusetts cities and a handful of other states.

It's based on the idea that, for many drug users, a call to the police — for a nonfatal overdose or a drug-related crime such as theft — is the first time they get on the radar of any authority. So after the immediate crisis is over, officers follow up and offer help. That could be a warm bed for the night, a referral to a recovery coach or needle-exchange program, a ride to detox. At the very least, they'll give out the overdose-rescue drug Narcan and talk about how to stay alive.

"It's kind of weird for a police officer to be talking to somebody, 'hey, if you're gonna use heroin, use it this way," Cacela said. "'Make sure you're not alone. Make sure there's Narcan on hand.'"

But even as police get used to this nonjudgmental role, it's not always an easy sell to drug users.

"Some people are very open and they'll talk to you. Other people [say], 'Get out of here. I don't want help, stupid cops,'" said Officer Jeffrey Goulet of South Hadley, Mass. "Not everyone's at that point in their life whether they want to stop."

Addiction researcher Alexander Walley of Boston Medical Center is evaluating this approach for the Centers for Disease Control. He says it's important not to push treatment too quickly after an overdose, when the brain is in withdrawal.

"Usually it's going to take a little more time, a little more reflection," Walley said.

Cacela eventually talked Ligawiec into meeting him at a donut shop, where he introduced her to a recovery coach named Susan Daley, and they started working together.

But a few months later, Ligaweic overdosed at home. She saved herself by using the Narcan they had left with her. And that's when she agreed to let them help her get into rehab.

"It was like a tornado went through and all that was left in the center was me and a vast land of ruin," Ligaweic said. "And having Susan and Officer Cacela there — it's life changing."

Almost a year since that first 911 call, Ligawiec and Cacela take weekly pottery classes together in Ware.

Cacela does this on his own time. As they sit at neighboring pottery wheels, throwing down lumps of wet clay, Ligaweic surveys her bowl-in-the-making.

"I don't think I'll ever know what I'm doing," she says. "I just hope it comes together."

To which Cacela responds, "that's a lot like life."

Not all Cacela's relationships are this close. He says he's reached out to about 60 overdose survivors; only about half got back to him.

Researchers say it's hard to quantify results of this type of outreach. They're looking at whether overdose rates are slowing down in towns that use it, and if relationships are improving between police and drug users.

Ligawiec said, if she relapses, she plans to call 911 herself — and start over again.



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SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

Bob Marley would have turned 75 this week. He was just 36 when he died of cancer in 1981. But his legacy is imperishable and enduring. This week, his estate released a new music video to accompany this track, "Redemption Song."

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "REDEMPTION SONG")

BOB MARLEY: (Singing) Old pirates, yes, they rob I, sold I to the merchant ships, minutes after they took I from the bottomless pits.

SIMON: Ziggy Marley, who's Bob Marley's son, joins us now from Los Angeles. Mr. Marley, thanks so much for being with us.

ZIGGY MARLEY: Good to be with you.

SIMON: You know, your father has been described over the years as a groundbreaking musician, a best-selling revolutionary, an international superstar. What do you want us to know about him and remember about him today?

Z MARLEY: Well, he's a loving man, you know? He's a loving man. I would think that is the most important thing.

SIMON: You were 12, I guess, when your father died. What do you remember of him?

Z MARLEY: Yeah, well, it was sad in those days, you know? But I remember him - one thing I remembers is when he was sick, we visited him in New York. He had just lost his hair, you know? And we were very, like, upset. The kids were.

SIMON: Yeah.

Z MARLEY: And he was, you know, trying to make fun with us and try to make us laugh and try to stay positive. So I remember that. I remember that as a part of his personality - trying to, you know, lighten the load, you know?

SIMON: Yeah. What made your father such a great performer, do you think - such a big star?

Z MARLEY: Well, I think him feel it. You know what I mean when I say him feel it? And in - he grew up in that culture where dancing and moving your body as a expression of a spiritual connection, that was a part of his upbringing. So I feel like it's something that's in him. It's not so much as performing and just expressing that spirit that you're feeling, you know?

SIMON: Do you have a favorite song?

Z MARLEY: I've a whole album (laughter) - "Survival." You know, people ask me if I have a favorite song. I can't answer it because there's no way I can have one...

SIMON: Yeah.

Z MARLEY: ...Favorite song.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "SURVIVAL")

B MARLEY: (Singing) How can you be sitting there telling me that you care, that you care, when every time I look around, the people suffer in the suffering in every way...

Z MARLEY: During my early teen years, that album kind of give me some direction, give me some knowledge because it was Afrocentric. And it was about unification and just stuff that made me think as a young teenager, you know?

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "SURVIVAL")

B MARLEY: (Singing) We're the survivors, yes, the black survivors.

SIMON: A quarter of all the reggae listened to by Americans was recorded by your father - that's amazing - so many years after his death.

Z MARLEY: Nice. Yeah, that's great, man. That's great.

SIMON: You know, I was looking at the Bob Marley 75th anniversary website the other day. And in big letters, it says love, peace, freedom. That kind of how it's turned out today?

Z MARLEY: Well, for the majority of people, yeah because a majority of people are good people, are peaceful people. But we're just not loud. We're just not on the TV. We're just not - you know, we're not in the news. It's just the people that are making war in the news. So we are more. The peaceful people are more. The good people are more. The loving people are more. We are most of the people. You know, sometimes, we'll still lose, even though we're the most (laughter).

SIMON: Ziggy Marley, the son of Bob Marley, who would have turned 75 this week, thanks so much for being with us.

Z MARLEY: Yeah, man. Give thanks, love. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.