At first glance, Davin Cole was a success story under the San Francisco police. He had a loving family in the suburbs of Bay Area, the respect of colleague officers and – as the renowned acting lieutenant – it was expected to get the promotion permanent.
But the 59-year-old hid a terrible secret: he had been addicted to Opioids and was now at the bottom of a decade.
By November 2021, the father of two pills beat back with Vodka night after night, his most important remedy for depression after 27 debilitating years that the streets checked.
So when his stocks ran low, only four days before he would fly to a wedding in Mexico, he made the 'stupidest' decision of his life. Cole took a sip of vodka, tied up on a face mask and robbed a rite auxiliary officer at shot.
His life of crime, however, was short -lived. Cole was arrested when he fled the store – his promising career in doors and a prison sentence guaranteed.
“It was the worst crime,” says Cole de Daily Mail. “I was just as ** t criminal.”
His story is one of a desperate man who is driven to drugs, addiction and ultimately redemption. And it raises the alarming question: what drives a lawyer citizen – an agent no less – to such a dramatic low point?
Davin Cole and his wife, Sonia, who stayed with him during his painkiller slave, failed theft and imprisonment
In November 2021 Cole fell out of his two daughters, shown above, at Cheerleading Practice and drove away to rob a neighborhood pharmacy
Cole traces his mental health problems back to his childhood when he was raised by a single mother in San Francisco. After entering the city's police in 1989, fight against Gangcrime and gun violence, his health began to deteriorate. But it was only two decades later that his addiction to opioids started.
While he worked as an officer in the K-9 unit in 2009, he was attacked by a police dog he was training. The animal locked itself on its left leg and left a wound the size of a golf ball in his calf, which quickly became infected.
Cole was prescribed Norco, a commonly used opioid, to numb his chronic pain – pills that he quickly started to depend on.
After he had undergone surgery on his calf in 2012, the most pain left. But he told doctors that he was still struggling and asked to continue to get the opioid medication, hydrocodone.
Cole with ridiculous ease had joined the more than two million Americans who were addicted to prescribed painkillers – a scourge that led to an explosion of opioids with black market, including Fentanyl.
“This medicine has no limits,” he says. 'CEOs are addicted to it. There are doctors, nurses, lawyers, judges. It's too easy. The first two years I never even realized that I was addicted. '
Cole's addiction to painkillers started when he was a K-9 officer in 2009 and a police dog held on his left leg, giving him a painful injury
Cole was admired by his colleagues for his work to help addicts to get good treatment and housing in San Francisco and was on his way to promotion when he robbed the rite aid
The sergeant, who was out of service at the time, was arrested outside of a Rite Aid pharmacy in San Mateo
At first glance, however, Cole says that he 'killed' it.
He had launched a city-wide homeless outreach team and had become the go-to expert of the city in the crisis of small crime, drugs and vagrancy in San Francisco.
But behind the scenes was a much darker image.
By 2018 he was washing the pills with alcohol to improve their effects and to steal extra drugs from friends and family to show himself between the fillings.
In the early days of his addiction, Cole told his wife, Sonia, a photographer, about his problem. She encouraged him to visit a doctor and thought the problem was in hand.
But in later years, when she confronted him His hanging eyes or unclear speech after one of his sessions in the late night, he told her he had been drinking or just had some sleeping pills.
In retrospect, he believes that his wife, now 48, and two daughters, now 19 and 28, were aware that he fought with serious demons. But the family had difficulty tackling the depth of his personal crisis openly.
Subsequently, on November 3, 2021, Cole's life unraveled in a spectacular way.
He had one more Norco pill and was no more than a week for a filling. In four days he would travel to Mexico for the long -awaited wedding.
By that time he would be paralyzed by a painful opioid comedown of sweat, chills, nausea, diarrhea and body pain. His lines of supply among friends and family had become dry and he did not want to try a dealer, who probably hit a deadly cocktail from Fentanyl.
So Cole was released a Haas-brain plan: robbing the Rite Aid-Pothie in the vicinity of his house to San Mateo.
“If you are addicted somewhere, there is a physical change in your brain,” says Cole. 'You are no longer rational. The drugs, the alcohol, or whatever it is, become the priority. '
He gathered a snub-Neus-Rolver from his safe at home, dropped his two daughters at Cheerleading Practice and then drove to the pharmacy. There he took a sip of vodka, covered his face with a mask and walked into the store.
Cole traces his mental health problems back to his childhood when he was raised by a single mother in San Francisco
The Opioid crisis has destroyed California, partly thanks to the loose prescription of powerful painkillers
Cole now talks about addiction and PTSD among agents and other first responds in podcasts
Cole tried to keep his drink and drug addictions secret of his wife, but she knew more than she left
When he came to the counter, he tried to stay calm. He gave the pharmacist a note and said: 'I have a gun, give me Norco not to push an alarm !! HAST!!'
After she had given him 11 bottles of the painkiller, Cole showed her the back of the note: 'Sorry !! Doctors made me wait 15 minutes to call the police. '
But it was already too late – an employee had called 911 and a police cruiser cut Cole when he left the store.
Within a few seconds Cole was sitting on his knees, buffered and was pulled into a car on his way to Thestation.
“I'm F **** D,” Cole said the officer who arrested him. “My life is over.”
Now he admits that he misjudged how the employees of the pharmacy shop would respond to the robbed of Schot. “Most companies tell their employees:” Give them what they want, wait until they leave and then call the police, “says Cole. “I thought I would be on my way home in my car.”
While he was processed at the San Matteo police station, Sonia became increasingly hectic. She knew he had had problems and was afraid he had committed suicide.
He finally called her from the station and told her that he was 'so sorry'. After Sonia saved him the next morning, an emotional Cole had difficulty explaining his addiction to his family.
But the solution was of course clear: rehabilitation. He checked that day in a center in the land of Sonoma and withdrew from the power before he could be disciplined or fired.
At the end of 2022 he did not argue for two crimes and was sentenced to a year behind bars and three years of probation. He served for six months, usually only in a cell as a protection against other prisoners who are looking for retribution on an agent.
Yet his family did not abandon him. When he was released – on Father's Day in 2023 – he returned home where he credit Sonia, with whom he celebrated his 29th birthday in February, to help his recovery.
'She stood by my side 100 percent, “Cole remembers. “She just stayed with me. She said, “We're going to beat this and things get better”. '
Her vow, it seemed, came out. After struggling to find work because of his conviction, Cole started his first full -time job earlier this year and carried out activities for a private security company.
But he says that his real passion requires consciousness, talks about addiction and PTSD among First Responders on a number of podcasts.
Four years after his crime, and Cole's message is surprising: optimism.
“In a way that has saved my life arrest,” he says now. “I led myself to rehabilitate. It gave me the help I needed. '
