Narconon was started in 1966 by a man named William Benitez who went by Willy. Willy started using drugs when he was twelve years old. He and some of his friends were on the way to a baseball game when they saw one of the local teenagers in the area. The young teen seemed really cool to Willy. He asked the boys if they had ever smoked pot before and the other kids ran away from him cause they knew it was bad news. The teen called out to Willy saying “Hey I know your hip man. You want to fly like a bird man?” Willy said that he didn’t want to seem like he wasn’t hip so he followed the young man and smoked marijuana. Willy said that he wanted to be like the guy cause he was so cool. He had nice shoes, nice hair and a lot of girls that always followed him around. Willy figured he must have been doing something right.
Willy Starts Using Harder Drugs
Willy started smoking marijuana and he said that when he first started he would only use it on the weekends or at parties and such. He told himself that he was not going to use it all the time, but this commitment soon fell to the way side. By the time Willy was fifteen he wanted to try harder drugs because the marijuana just wasn’t doing it for him anymore. This was when he started shooting narcotics.
Willy lived most of the beginning of his adult life as a heroin addict. He would go in and out jail and failed two marriages due to his addiction. Every time he went to prison he would make the resolution that when he got back out again he was not going to go back to using. Every time he got out he would use again much to his and everyone else’s dismay. He just could not get control over his addiction, his life or himself.
Willy Goes Back to Prison
Around Christmas time Willy got picked up by the police again for possession of heroin. He went before the judge and pleaded his case. He told the judge that he did not want to be an addict and he was going to do whatever he could to get control of his life. He said at that time his addiction had control over him and that he had lost two marriages due to it, but he knew there was something inside of himself that was going to help him to get clean again. Willy said that maybe the judge saw something in him, or maybe he just felt bad because it was around Christmas, but he gave Willy the least amount of time possible for the charges that he had and considering his past criminal record.
When Willy got into the holding cell, a friend of his dropped off some books for him to read to pass the time. One of the books was an old battered copy of a book called Fundamentals of Thought, written by Hubbard. Willy said that when he started reading the book the guy was talking about how to increase one’s ability at succeeding at life. It was like a light bulb went off in Willy’s head. He said that the reason that he was unable to get and stay and off drugs for any period of time was because he did not have the abilities that were needed to cope with life. He said addiction is a disability. He meant that drug addicts do not have the tools or abilities to cope with life and because of this they would feel really bad about themselves and their surrounding situations. Instead of having the tools to fix the situations, the person only has the tool of using drugs to numb the pain of not being able to cope. Drug addicts are like ball players who don’t know the rules of the game. They might go around scoring for the other team, or might look at the ball and have no idea of what to do with it. Willy said that Narconon was like the rule book of life teaching people how play and win.
Willy worked on his own abilities for a long time everyday while he was in prison. He got to the point where he knew what he needed to do with life and knew how to help others do the same. He went to the Warden and asked for permission to start a drug rehab in the prison for people who’s drug trends had been similar to his own. Meaning, people who had been arrested for drug charges.
Narconon is Born
It took a few months, but Willy was finally able to start his rehab center in the Arizona State Penitentiary. He called it Narconon meaning narcotics non. The rehab was very successful very quickly and before long there where even inmates who did not have addictions to drugs who wanted to do the program. After a few months Willy and some volunteers started another Narconon program for work release inmates out side the prison by the annex walls. The Narconon reviews of the people who were participating in the Narconon located inside the prison walls were great enough to convince prison officials of the need to start the second Narconon.
Willy had started TWO Narconon programs at the prison within a couple months. At one point Willy was scheduled to be released from prison, but he went before the judge and told him that he was not ready to be released because he wanted to help Narconon get a little more established and running smoother before he felt like he could leave the jail. When Willy did get out of prison he decided to go further west and start Narconon California in Los Angeles. This was the first Narconon that was not located in a prison and Willy started it with his wife and a handful of volunteers.
Since that time, Narconon has grown to be one of the most successful rehab centers in the world with centers located all over the globe. Narconon has a seventy-six percent success rate and helps thousands and thousands of people every year to overcome their addictions. Our thanks go to you Willy!
