Craig Burk

Craig Burk
5-2-1977 to 6-9-2000

Craig was a fun loving good student with everything to live for. At 23 he had an undergraduate degree in Accounting and was about to complete his masters at Ball State University in Indiana. At his college memorial service, Dr. Jones, the chairman of the CICS program, spoke of Craig as being one of the most dedicated, good natured human beings he'd ever met. He had been awarded a graduate assistantship, and was asked by the Dean of the Business School to be his personal assistant. Craig was very close to his family. He was particularly close to his sister; talking her into coming to the same college, and then taking her under his wing. He became more like a father figure to her for the next two years, where they were fortunate to share their college experience together. There was a picture of Craig’s mother holding the family dog up on his bulletin board. The only guy in his fraternity to have a picture of his mother up in his room, but at 6'5", 280 pounds, no one was going to tease him about that.

Craig was really into health and fitness. He watched what he ate and exercised daily. So why did he think it was okay to consume GHB; to put this into his well cared for body? He had researched the drug on the internet and was assured by the sites he had found that the drug was not harmful.

Some friends were going out to the bars…he wanted to save some money…some GHB was around…he could take a hit of that and not spend much money on beer. He'd done it before, what was different this time? Why is GHB so fickle? Others did it that night too. He started to feel bad...started to shake...clutch the bar...his friends took him home to sleep it off. They checked on him every few minutes...........

The level of GHB in his body was quite low, \and his blood alcohol level was .08.

Sadly the idea of letting someone just "sleep it off" doesn't cut it with GHB. No one can predict who will be OK.......and who won't.