Mom to judge: my sobriety comes before my son

YOUNGSTOWN

Amy Mitchell told a judge Friday she would choose sobriety over her heroin-addicted son.

Mitchell, 42, was answering a question from Judge Shirley J. Christian in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court just before she was sentenced to three years of probation on a third-degree felony charge of possession of heroin.

Christian asked Mitchell, who told the judge she has a full-time job and is undergoing drug and mental-health counseling, whether she would avoid people and places where heroin and heroin users are found.

The judge asked her what she would do if her son came to her one night and said the same things about staying clean to Mitchell that she was saying to the judge.

Through tears, Mitchell said she would not take him in.

“I cannot let him stay at my house,” Mitchell said.

She said her husband would probably make sure he left. She said the last time she took her son in, she ended up arrested on drug charges after she had been clean for several years.

“He’s my only son and I took him in. But I didn’t know he would destroy my life,” Mitchell said. “I can’t take him in. That’s sad.”

Read more of her story in Saturday's Vindicator or on Vindy.com.