Faith Helps Ex-Addicts Reach Out

Jamie Smith chuckled as he remembered the man who, two years ago, led him to Victory Outreach, the fundamentalist Christian church that helped him break his 16-year-old heroin addiction. That man was his drug supplier.

“My heroin connection knew about Victory Outreach, and he brought me here. . . . We went in through the front door and he went out the back and left me there,” Smith said. “God ministered to me, and I got saved that night.”

Smith entered the Victory Outreach rehabilitation program and, after 13 months, he dedicated his life to helping others through the outreach.

Operates Four Homes

Smith is now a spokesman for Victory Outreach church in Logan Heights, a nondenominational rehabilitation ministry that operates four live-in homes in the county for hardened gang members, alcoholics and drug addicts. At the homes--situated in remote parts of Lakeside and El Cajon, and in Encanto and Logan Heights--the residents follow strict rules designed to help them “reintegrate” into society.

Victory Outreach was founded by Sonny Arguinzoni, a former gang member and drug abuser who began the program in his East Los Angeles home 24 years ago. It has expanded to form more than 50 churches in 14 states nationwide, in Mexico, Holland and Africa. By the end of the year, it hopes to have churches in Brazil and England, Smith said.

Each day Outreach program members, themselves former addicts, walk the worst sections of town in search of lost souls. One-on-one, they talk with society’s castaways, giving them testimonies of their own rehabilitation.

Today, Outreach members and supporters will march through downtown San Diego to show the community that their program, which relies heavily on their Christian religious beliefs, can make a difference.

“We work with drug addicts, prostitutes and gang members, basically those with a criminal background,” Smith said. “We get them away from their environment and teach them basic Christian principles. They come in because they’re hurting and tired, they’re sick of their life style. The reason we can relate to them is because we came from that background, from the pastor on down. We don’t ever forget where we came from and who we left behind. We have to go back and reach those people.”

Tony Guzman, the pastor who founded San Diego’s Victory Outreach in 1984, agreed. “I don’t think it takes a dope fiend to reach a dope fiend, but it sure helps.” Guzman said he was an addict who tried every drug he could get his hands on.

“Jesus filled the emptiness I was trying to fill with drugs,” he said.

Founded San Diego Branch

After he was helped by a Victory Outreach church in San Bernardino, Guzman founded the San Diego branch to help other addicts fill the emptiness in their lives. “I want to try to reach the people no one else wants to reach and possibly can’t reach. Our philosophy is, ‘Reach, teach and train.’ We reach them, teach them a new life and train them to go back and reach others,” he said.

Leon Moore, 27, a former Crips gang member and “crack” addict, became a counselor in one of the homes after the program changed his life. “I tried all the worldly drug programs--Narcotics Anonymous, Alcoholics Anonymous, CRASH (Community Resources and Self Help Inc.), Second Chance--I always went back to the same thing. It was just superficial healing. . . . God heals the problem, “ Moore said.

Victory Outreach has been criticized by some in the county probation department because it is unlicensed, but Outreach officials said that, until recently, they lacked the money for licensing. Nevertheless, other county and community officials say Victory Outreach is singularly successful.

Rachael Ortiz, executive director of the Barrio Station, said, “They’re very religious, and for those who can respond to that and be helped by that, I think it’s wonderful. They’ve been able to help people I didn’t think could be helped . . . hard-core, middle-aged heroin addicts, people who have had a good 20- to 30- year addiction.”

Ortiz believes the program is a success in part because ex-addicts run it. “I have seen that concept fail over and over and over . . . but they’ve been doing an excellent job,” she said.

“No one can match their success rate,” said Ricardo Jimenez, a parole agent with the Department of Corrections in El Cajon who has referred parolees to Victory Outreach.

“They use Bible study and lot of prayer as principal means of dealing with changing behavior . . . they make no bones that that is their primary treatment,” Jimenez said. “But I’m not inclined to question them, given their outcome. Where other programs have failed miserably, these guys are batting .500 in my book.”

43% Stay Off Drugs

Of the 72% that complete the program nationwide, 43% of the residents remain drug-free, said Gary Penovich, administrative director for rehabilitation services at Victory Outreach corporate headquarters in La Puente. An estimated 20% of San Diego’s residents agree to be court-committed to Victory Outreach in alternative sentencing or conditions of probation, Smith said.

Ronald Bobo, supervising attorney for the public defender’s office in El Cajon, said his office uses Victory Outreach on a case-by-case basis. “We will not recommend it unless a person wants to go there. If they’re comfortable with it, we’ve found it does have success . . . . They demand a real, total commitment to total abstinence, and substitute a zealous religion for the use of drugs and alcohol,” Bobo said.

Victory Outreach keeps a low profile and relies entirely on donations and fund-raisers organized by the residents of the homes to support its daily operations. Today’s march, called “The Right Step,” is an attempt to gain exposure and raise funds for their program.

The march, which begins at 10 a.m. in front of police headquarters on Broadway between 14th and 15th streets, will proceed south on 14th Street, west on Market Street and south on Kettner, ending at the Embarcadero Marina Park near Seaport Village. A festival is planned in the park after the march.

“This is the first time we’ve gone public to push what we’re doing,” said Carlos Alaniz, a Victory Outreach member and the former “heroin connection” who brought Smith to the program two years ago. Shortly afterward, Alaniz also became committed to working with the outreach.

“We’re proclaiming to the city that we want to reach these people and bring them into society as productive citizens,” Alaniz said. “We plan on opening seven more (homes) throughout the community, where there’s gang violence, where there’s drug addicts, anywhere where there’s trouble.”