Nov. 4--Opiates addict Stephanie L. Pack promised Huron County Common Pleas Judge Jim Conway she will "stay clean."

Pack has been in a Cleveland outpatient treatment program for the past six months. She said she is currently on 80 mg of methadone, which is used for opiate dependency.

"I don't want to be addicted to something else," Pack said during Tuesday's hearing.

"I am going to stay clean. I know it's not a high percentage rate," Pack told Conway, but said she truly wants to be drug-free.

Counselors want to eventually reduce Pack to being on 10 mg of methadone per week "at most," she said, because they don't feel comfortable reducing the dosage any faster.

"Six weeks getting me off is comfortable," Pack told Conway.

Huron County Assistant Prosecutor Richard Woodruff recommended probation instead of a jail term for Pack "to see if she could make it happen," referring to be drug-free.

"She's doing well," Woodruff said about her treatment.

In mid-September, Pack, 29, of 4559 Laylin Road, pleaded guilty to possession of Oxycontin for having nearly a dozen pills during an April 15 traffic stop on Bank Street. She testified Oct. 23 in a separate trial a mutual friend, Kurtis J. DeWitt, gave her the drugs for her birthday hours before she was arrested outside of DeWitt's Bank Street home.

"He said, 'Stephanie, I'm going to trust you. You can't tell anyone. I robbed Kaiser-Wells,'" Pack said when testifying for the state.

"I was completely, absolutely shocked," she said.

While in the Huron County Jail the day after the crime and Pack's arrest, DeWitt's getaway driver, Megan Lillo, gave her six Oxycontin pills, Pack said, so she would avoid "puking all over the place in the jail" from withdrawal.

DeWitt is serving 15 years in prison for the Benedict Avenue armed robbery and putting drugs into his body to sneak them into the jail. After four days of testimony, a jury convicted DeWitt's longtime girlfriend, Megan Lillo, for similar crimes. She will be sentenced Thursday.

Pack denied being friends with DeWitt or Lillo, calling them "shady people" when she testified.

Speaking about her drug addiction Tuesday, Pack said her dependency on opiates increased after she took the pain medication for back pain and a crashrelated sternum injury.

"Most of it was not recreational. ... Most of it was prescribed for pain," she said.

Her fiance has been driving her to Cleveland for treatment. Pack said her fiance doesn't drink or do drugs and her two children, who will be 2 and 5 in December and February, are living in "a safe environment."

"I've always been there for my children. They are the priority in my life," she said.

On Tuesday, Conway sentenced Pack to three years of intensively supervised probation and ordered her to undergo random drug screens at her own cost. She also was fined $500 and had her driver's license suspended for six months. If Pack violates her probation, she faces one year in prison.

"I do believe you'd be a good candidate for community control," Conway told her.

However, the judge warned Pack that her previous offenses, drug history and associations with DeWitt and Lillo gave him "pause."

"I'm going to tell you, you have to be very careful on probation," Conway said. "It's a very thin line and short rope to work with."

"I understand that and appreciate it, sir," Pack responded.

-----

To see more of the Norwalk Reflector or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.norwalkreflector.com/.

Copyright (c) 2009, Norwalk Reflector, Ohio

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.