Penny Wood

Meth abuser regrets agreeing to poster duty

By Kate McCann
Chicago Tribune

Police booking photo of Penny Wood in 1998.

PEKIN, Ill. — Penny Wood agreed last month to let authorities publish photographs of her that graphically depict the ravages of methamphetamine use. She believed this unusual provision of a plea-bargain agreement to escape a long prison sentence might deter others from using the homemade drug.

But local distribution of the photos has become something of a modern-day scarlet letter for Wood, who said she scarcely can walk down the streets in the central Illinois river town of Pekin without people pointing and whispering. She is the butt of jokes on local radio, and a grandson said he worries the "after" picture in which "Grandma looks purple" will show up in his elementary school.

But state prosecutors plan to keep circulating the pictures, the centerpiece of a public campaign against methamphetamine use. They believe the pictures are convincing local teenagers with a surprisingly effective argument that meth might make them ugly.

Prosecutors' refusal to back down in the face of Wood's complaints and threats of a lawsuit illustrates how concerned authorities are becoming about meth, as the powerfully addictive drug gains popularity. Methamphetamine is a particular problem in rural areas, where many of its ingredients can be found in farm fertilizers.

The idea was born recently when Tazewell County State's Attorney Stewart Umholtz sorted through before and after pictures of Wood, charged several times with drug offenses.

In the first picture, a police booking photo from a drug arrest in 1998, Wood was a full-faced, youthful-looking woman. In the second, a 2002 booking photo, Wood is a gaunt, sickly 40-year-old with dry, cracked facial skin and poor color.

"When I first saw the two, it was apparent the photographs themselves described the dangers of methamphetamine use better than any words I can ever use," Umholtz said.

Police booking photo of Penny Wood in 2002.

Umholtz's office soon offered a plea bargain that would free Wood on probation if she would consent to the public use of her photos.

"The state is allowed to use booking photos for drug-education purposes," the agreement said. "No identifying information shall be used."

Wood signed the document, and prosecutors agreed to lower her sentence to the 32 days she had served in the county jail and four years of probation. Wood, who had been convicted of drug possession once before, could have received 30 years in prison if convicted of unlawful criminal-drug conspiracy.

Her understanding of the agreement, she now says, is that her photographs would be used in a low-key awareness program, maybe at local drug-treatment and prevention programs. She said she also believed that no one would find out who she was.

"It was to be used for drug-education purposes only, to keep kids off drugs," Wood said. "Because that picture would. If that picture doesn't shock a child, I don't know what will."

Local officials thought so, too. The photos soon were posted at the local Boys & Girls Club, the probation office and on the Web site of Umholtz's office. High-school officials also plan to post the pictures, and police in neighboring jurisdictions have asked for copies.

In accordance with his agreement, Umholtz never released Wood's name. In Pekin, population 33,000, that hasn't made much difference. Newspapers have published her name with the photos, and everybody knows who Wood is by now anyway.

The photos have persuaded at least some teenagers to stay off meth.

"It's disgusting," said Jon Behrends, 18, referring to Wood's photos.

"It made me see what it does to you and the effects that it has on your body," said Chris Lang, 18.

That reaction is what Umholtz said he had in mind. His intent was not to punish Wood, he said, but to scare kids away from the drug.

But a mile and a half away from Tazewell County Courthouse, Wood hunkers down in her cluttered apartment, chain-smoking Marlboros and cursing the day she signed the agreement. She said she is in an outpatient rehabilitation program and is clean and sober.

Her main objection, she said, is the humiliation suffered by her four children and 10 grandchildren. "I have no problem trying to help keep people off drugs," Wood said. "But they went about it wrong. ... I don't want my grandchildren to keep paying for my mistakes."