Lance Strickland, 18, Oregon

My condolences to his family and friends.

Lance Strickland was 18 years old and lived in Joseph, Oregon.  He did not go on to college, but some of his buddies did, attending Oregon State University in Corvallis.  Strickland seems to have had friends on the football team.

The football team returns to campus before school starts, and is housed in one of the dormitories, Finley Hall.  On the night of September 2, some of the football players had a party that Strickland attended.    Strickland was found dead in the dorm the morning of September 3, 2005.

Upon autopsy, Strickland's blood alcohol was found to be 0.43.  Three members of the football team,  Greggory Peatt,   Michael Marks,  and  John Ronnfeldt, have been  have been indicted by a grand jury for allegedly furnishing alcohol to minors.

From an editorial in the Oregonian

Lance Strickland, 1987-2005
Isn't it time we stopped treating binge drinking as an inevitable hazard of growing up?
Wednesday, October 05, 2005

When Lance Strickland died of complications related to alcohol poisoning last month, it isn't true that the whole town of Joseph turned out for his memorial service. It only felt that way.

If you can break a town's heart, the death of this irrepressible 18-year-old broke Joseph's. Many people in the town of 1,080 had watched Strickland grow up, and they took an almost parental pride in him and his close friend, Mike Marks, a freshman offensive lineman at Oregon State University.

Marks is a genuine high school football talent. People in the area expect great things from Marks, and they still do, despite his indictment this week, along with two other OSU football players, on charges of furnishing alcohol to Strickland.

Strickland wasn't an OSU student but had gone to Corvallis to celebrate with his buddy before OSU's opening game. Although Strickland played three sports in high school, it wasn't his athletic prowess people admired. It was his personality. A young man who relished the outdoors and loved a challenge, especially "climbing to the tops of mountains," as his obituary said, Strickland radiated enthusiasm.

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In all cases, my deepest condolences to family and friends.

Underage Alcohol Deaths 2004
Underage Alcohol Deaths 2005
Underage Alcohol Deaths 2006

Signs of Alcohol Poisoning

Alcohol depresses nerves that control involuntary actions such as breathing, the heartbeat and the gag reflex that prevents choking. A fatal dose of alcohol will eventually stop these functions. After the victim stops drinking, the heart keeps beating, and the alcohol in the stomach continues to enter the bloodstream and circulate through the system. The victim may experience the following:

• Mental confusion, stupor, coma, unable to rouse the person
• No response to pinching the skin
• Vomiting while sleeping or unresponsive
• Seizures
• Slowed breathing  (fewer than 8 breaths per minute)
• Irregular breathing (10 seconds or more between breaths)
• Hypothermia (low body temperature), bluish skin color, paleness

Alcohol Poisoning Requires Immediate Medical Attention

Alcohol Poisoning Cannot Be Reversed By:

• Drinking black coffee
• Taking a cold bath or shower
• Walking it off

The victim must have immediate medical attention.
Call 911, stay with the victim to prevent him choking on vomit, and tell emergency personnel how much alcohol the victim drank.

These Children Died of Alcohol Overdose, So Their Parents Started Foundations:

Taylor Webster's memorial foundation.  Taylor died of alcohol  poisoning at age 19-- Now his family and friends are working  to get the message out, telling their stories and providing  information on alcohol poisoning and the signs and symtoms  of alcohol poisoning in hopes that lives will be saved.

Bradley McCue's memorial foundation.  On November 5, 1998  Bradley turned 21. . He celebrated  his birthday in a way that has become increasingly popular, drinking "his  age in shots". That amount of alcohol was lethal and he died  that night of alcohol poisoning.

Samantha Spady's memorial foundation. A 19-year old student at Colorado State University, Spady died of alcohol poisoning on September 5, 2004, "an unintentional tragedy."  The Spadys say the SAM [Student Alcohol Management] Spady Foundation will develop peer-to-peer counseling and other services meant to reduce the risk of alcohol abuse.

Gordie Bailey's memorial foundation Mission: to provide today’s youth with the skills to navigate the dangers of alcohol, and through education and promotion of self worth prevent alcohol poisoning, binge drinking and hazing. 

Kimberly Ostien's memorial foundation: "With binge drinking on the rise, we feel it necessary to get the message out on the danger of alcohol, especially excessive alcohol consumed in a short period of time.  Students are educated on drugs and alcohol but they will continue to experiment no matter what.  We want to educate on what to do when a friend falls down or passes out from drinking.  Often we want to put that person to bed to sleep it off and that is when the trouble can begin."  The card lists the information, above.

Comments

[Liz]

More about Lance:

Lance’s legacy: More than just a stat

By Mary Ann Albright--CORVALLIS GAZETTE-TIMES

Lance Strickland should be preparing for college right now. He should be volunteering in grade schools, fighting fires and fishing with buddies.

Instead, the 18-year-old from Joseph was found dead Sept. 3 in an unoccupied room in Finley Hall at Oregon State University.

Since his death last month, Lance went from vital athlete, son, friend and mentor to the face college health experts and media outlets use to accompany cautionary tales about underage and binge drinking. But to those who knew him, Lance’s story is more than an illustration of a statistic.

Switching between present and past tense, Bill recounted the legacy his son left to his family and tight-knit hometown.

“He liked sports. He liked to fish, and he was good at it. A lot of times, we’d go fishing, and he’d be the only one who caught anything.”

When his son came to OSU during the first weekend in September to visit a friend on the football team, Bill assumed Lance would return home safe and happy. Unfortunately, it was not to be.

Lance spent the Friday evening before the Beavers’ first home game of the season partying on campus and drinking whiskey. Lance drank too much. Friends left him in a dorm room to sleep off the booze, and he never woke up.

An autopsy revealed that Lance’s blood-alcohol level was .43. A person is considered legally intoxicated with a blood-alcohol level that exceeds .08. Lance’s death was attributed to either alcohol poisoning or aspiration of vomit.

Three OSU football players have been charged with crimes relating to Lance’s death. Greggory Daniel Peat, 17 at the time of the incident, and Michael Marks, 18, were each indicted on two counts of furnishing alcohol to a minor. John Christian Ronnfeldt, 21, was indicted on four counts of furnishing alcohol to a minor.

Lance is survived by his father, Bill; his mother, Diana Wortman; and siblings Jacob, Liza and Emma Strickland.

A life cut short

At the time of his death, Lance was working as a firefighter. He planned to attend Lewis-Clark State College in Lewiston, Idaho, next year.

“He wanted to study accounting of all things,” Bill said. “It was kind of surprising to me.”

Much more surprising to friends and former teachers is the fact that he’ll never realize his dream of opening an accounting firm in his hometown.

“It was innocent fun gone bad,” said Larry Johnson, athletic director of Joseph High School. “You hear about those kinds of things happening, but you don’t expect it to happen to a kid you know really well.”

Lance, a three-sport athlete, worked with Johnson during high school. He also acted as the teacher’s assistant for two years, helping teach PE classes to grade-school students.

“He was outstanding,” Johnson recalled. “The young kids really looked up to him. He didn’t have an enemy one. He was just one of those kids who was just a pleasure to be around.”

Lance graduated from Joseph High School in June 2005. He played baseball and football and also wrestled. His senior year, he went to the state wrestling championships, where he placed sixth in the 160-pound weight division. In 2004, he received a degree from the Oregon FFA program, which emphasizes the practical and applied study of math, science, English, social science and leadership using agriculture education.

One of the students partying with Lance on the night he died was Clayton Hayward, 18, a friend from Joseph.

Clayton’s father, Mike Hayward, said the death rattled the town. With a population of just 1,000, practically everyone’s a neighbor in Joseph.

“There’s this sense among parents that this could happen to anyone,” he said.

Stemming the tide

Lance Strickland’s death is only one of the alcohol-related tragedies to strike the campus community in recent years. Since 2001, at least four OSU students have died or sustained serious injuries in incidents tied to alcohol.

Eric Alexander, OSU’s substance abuse prevention coordinator, said excessive alcohol use is a concern for colleges across the nation, including OSU.

As Frank the Tank from “Old School” becomes this generation’s Bluto of “Animal House,” advertising, marketing and media images perpetuate a false perception that binge drinking is a rite of passage, Alexander said.

The university hired Alexander in June as the full-time coordinator of its campuswide substance abuse prevention strategies, policies and educational programs.

To begin to reverse the trend of problem drinking among college students, Alexander emphasizes a proactive and holistic approach. Rather than waiting to respond to tragedies such as Lance’s death, Alexander tries to work with individual students, the OSU community, Corvallis businesses, neighborhood associations and local law enforcement to chip away at the number of students drinking to excess.

A friend remembered

Clayton Lowe, 18, of Joseph played football with Lance for six years and wrestled alongside him for five. Lowe has fond memories of times the two spent on buses traveling to away games or fishing on the Snake River during their senior ag class trip.

The freshman at Eastern Oregon University in La Grande laughed as he conjured up a memory of Lance putting a kneepad on his head “like a Smurf’s hat” and clowning around to make his teammates smile.

“He led more by example than anything else. We all respected him because he played really hard. He never talked smack about anyone. He talked with his cleats like you’re supposed to,” Lowe said. “He was not a quitter. He never complained. Coaches loved him for that. We all did.”

Lowe attended his friend’s funeral at the Enterprise Cemetery, donning his high school football jersey as a tribute to his teammate. Lance’s own jersey draped his coffin.

“I cried,” Lowe said. “A lot of us did.”

Recent deaths

In recent years, there have been numerous alcohol-related injuries and deaths involving the Corvallis college community.

• May 2001: Sean Matsuda, a 19-year-old pre-dentistry student at OSU, drowned while partying with his fraternity at Lake Shasta. “Shasta Weekend,” which usually coincides with OSU’s Mother’s Day Weekend, has since come under fire as a dangerous tradition that encourages the potentially deadly combination of boating and alcohol.
• March 2002: OSU student Spencer Haugh, 20, died after falling off a fire escape at a fraternity. He had a blood-alcohol content of .20.
• May 2005: The annual Shasta rite of passage came under further scrutiny with the suicide of 22-year-old Gina Zalunardo, an OSU student partying on Slaughterhouse Island with members of the university’s Greek community. Autopsy reports listed Zalunardo’s blood-alcohol level at 0.14.
• May 2005: Kevin Manning, a 20-year-old OSU student, seriously injured his neck and spinal cord when he dived into a makeshift swimming pool at a fraternity house. Investigators reported that alcohol played a role in the incident.
• September 2005: Lance Strickland, an 18-year-old from Joseph, died in an OSU dorm room while partying with friends before a football game. His blood-alcohol level was .43, and his death was attributed to either alcohol poisoning or aspiration of vomit

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Again, my deepest condolences to Lance's friends and family.

[Toviyah Lowe]

Clayton Lowe is my older brother. I remember how hard it was for him to sit down with me and tell me that his wrestling buddy and fishing confidant had died. I knew Lance too and the funeral was so intense with emotion. He was so young and funny and talented.