AMISH DRUG ARRESTS SADDEN STAID CULTURE

Two Men Indicted For Dealing At Hoedowns In Pennsylvania

GAP, Pa. -- Some Amish drink their share of beer when they're young, a
taste of temptation that is a rite of passage even in a place as mythically
moral as Amish country. But selling cocaine? Mingling with a motorcycle
gang called the Pagans? With bikers known as ``Twisted'' and ``Fathead''?

Amish residents of this eastern Pennsylvania town picked up their
newspapers Wednesday morning and read about two of their own: young Amish
men from Gap with the most common last name in town, Stoltzfus. Young men
reared in a strict but increasingly threatened culture in which people
abstain from material pleasures and adhere to a spartan life of decency and
faith.

These two young men, however, were indicted in federal court in
Philadelphia on Tuesday on charges that they bought cocaine and
methamphetamine from members of another local subculture -- the Pagans --
and then sold the drugs to youths at Amish hoedowns in Gap and other
Lancaster County communities. According to the indictment, they were cogs
in a drug ring that united two seemingly incompatible cultures for five years.

Abner Stoltzfus, 24, and Abner King Stoltzfus, 23 -- who are not related --
were at home with their families, declining to comment while awaiting
arraignment next week on charges that could send them to prison for life.
Eight Pagans were also indicted.

``I guess it goes to show you we're human beings, just like everyone
else,'' observed Abram Stoltzfus -- no relation to the defendants -- as he
stood on the stoop of his immaculate white farmhouse. ``These things are
going to happen. It's sad.''

At the time of the alleged drug-dealing, both young men were in a period of
their lives that the Amish call a ``timeout,'' when young men are
encouraged to sow their wild oats before deciding whether to rejoin the
faith for the rest of their lives.

``I'm not suggesting that the Amish hierarchy condones drug use or anything
like that, but they're going through a period of time when they are allowed
to be rebellious,'' said John Pyfer, the attorney for Abner Stoltzfus.
Pyfer said his client would plead not guilty.

The indictment of two Amish men on charges of pushing drugs on Amish kids
is particularly jolting because many Americans consider the Amish something
of a national treasure, a plain-living, hard-working and God-fearing people
who eschew such luxuries as cars, electricity and colorful clothing in
favor of family and faith.

Yet people who study the Amish culture, and even the normally reticent
Amish themselves, say it's getting harder for members of this Anabaptist
religious sect to maintain their way of life, particularly in a place like
Lancaster County, where suburban sprawl and outlet malls are leaving too
little land for the Amish to farm and too little room on the road for their
horse-drawn buggies.

``It's a big myth of Amish society being perfect, a bunch of puritans
living an idyllic life out in the country,'' said Daniel Lee, a Penn State
University professor who has researched the Amish. ``To put it plainly,
they are very normal people.''

Checked-by: Richard Lake