Ben Garvin

Stills: Drunk Hospice

The men at this St. Paul 'wet house' don't want your help, or your hope. And they won't get better. It's a place where the most hopeless of alcoholics can drink away their final days at less risk and cost to the public. At St. Anthony Residence, liquor can be their life -- and death.

Chronic alcoholics can cost the public more than $120,000 a year for use of hospitals, de-tox, jails and treatment programs. 50-year-old chronic alcoholic Phil Brendale, seen here stumbling towards his sleeping spot in a park in St. Paul on a cold night, recently he walked into an emergency room for rectal bleeding. He was given an MRI but he never went back for the results. "I know what they're going to tell me. 'Quit drinking, quit smoking'. You might as well tell me to quit breathing," Brendale said. "One day, we're all going to die. So, let me die happy." Brendale was kicked out of St. Anthony Residence, a hospice for alcoholics, three years ago for breaking the rules.
   
Resident assistant Bruce Hall removes an empty bottle of vodka he found in a resident's room as he was doing his nightly room check at St. Anthony Residence. The resident was conscious and naked on the floor. Hall checked that he was okay, put a pillow under his head and closed the door. It's against house rules to drink indoors, but many residents sneak in liquor to avoid drinking in the cold.
   
A resident starts the morning out with a bottle of vodka and a cigarette.
     
  
The shelter tucked behind St. Anthony Residence is the only spot on site where residents are allowed to drink. It was the first of the month, a celebratory time, when all residents receive their $89 monthly stipend and can afford the liquor of their choice. When the money runs our some residents recycle cans or, in the most desperate cases, drink mouthwash.
   
Marion Hagerman, left, and Nick Babou hug after spending the morning drinking. "It's a friendly environment, but they are not my friends," said Hagerman. "They are just the people I drink with."
   
54-year-old Marion Hagerman comes in from the cold to return his half-drunk bottle of vodka to the front desk for safe keeping. Before moving into St. Anthony Residence Hagerman had been arrested about 60 times and continued drinking despite six DUI convictions and six 28-day treatment sessions. After St. Anthony, he hasn't had a single arrest, detox stay or emergency room visit.
     
  
"When a guy's gotta drink, he's gotta drink," said 61-year-old Wayne Britton, a 12-time DUI offender. Since he was admitted to St. Anthony six years ago, Britton has stopped driving, refuses to beg for money and has stayed out of jail and detox. "You have a place to live and a place to drink," said Britton. "How are you going to get into trouble?"
   
After being wheeled back to his room from being unable to walk, staff member Sean Conway, left, sets Marion Hagerman back onto his bed in his 12x12 concrete room. Hagerman had just spent the morning polishing off a bottle of mouthwash. "If not for this place, I would be drinking in the street, in and out of detox," said Hagerman, a 39-year alcoholic. "Here, I know I can always find my way home."