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6/11/2007 2:51:38 PM
6/11/2007 5:15:00 PM
Tampa, Florida -- Sarah Rinaldi spent the evening of June 29, 2006 with some friends and overdosed on Zanax and Oxycontin.
"She wasn't doing very well," says her mother Julie. "She was with her friends and they just... nobody would call 911 to come and get her, and she just slowly, just slowly died that day."
Julie channeled her grief into researching prescription drug abuse among teens, and what she discovered was frightening.
"It's huge. More so than I realized. I knew there was a problem, but in the last 11 months, I have become very educated."
She also discovered parents who couldn't afford expensive treatment programs for their children. So Julie has developed a line of skin care products called "Pink Star."
The money raised from sales will be used to fund treatment options for adolescents with drug or alcohol problems.
"I just figured if I could save one child and one family from this, it would all be worth it," Julie says. "Try to make some positive out of the worst nightmare that a parent can have."
Three years ago, Sarah met photographer Bob Thompson, who shot some impromptu photographs of the young teen. He is now donating his skills to Julie's project by taking pictures of her products for the website.
"One of the positive points of something like this happening is it gives people like me and the rest of the people that have jumped in with both feet an opportunity to do something that you know is going to make a difference for somebody else down the line," he explains.
Julie is hopeful teenagers will learn a lesson from her daughter's death, that drugs don't discriminate.
"It's not always somebody else," Julie says. "It can be them. And it was Sarah. She didn't think it would happen to her, either."
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