There are plenty of rich addicts. Charlie Sheen and Whitney Houston spring to mind. Anna Nicole Smith was a literal billionaire.

“Tough love” is also a real thing. Families throw addicts out all the time. the idea is that if things get bad enough the addict will “hit bottom” and seek help.

The idea of a dealer killing a customer is the part that makes little sense. The dealer wouldn’t give an addict drugs without cash up front. Dealers know exactly how unreliable addicts are.

How about the addict tries to steal from the dealer and the dealer kills them in self defense?

You might want to look up the case of Carrol O’Connor. Famous actor, his son died after an overdose. O’Connor called the son’s dealer a murderer and the dealer tried to sue him for defamation of character.

Bro narcotics are probably the most reliable thing that kills rich people

More realistic might be the addict does something stupid out of desperation like try to rob his dealer and is killed in the process.

They tend to be pretty miserable and can afford them so my gut feeling is that they are actually more likely.

I would point out the way drug dealers kill their customers is unintentionally via overdose or bad drugs.

Also, if you’re a parent, and you lost your only child to a drug dealer due to an overdose, that’s really all you need to want to hunt down and kill the dealer.

A parent with nothing left to lose could be about as dangerous as it gets.

Killing your junkies don’t make sense. Even with small dealers they know how much they can ‘lend out’ to their clients. After the client gets to the point they get cut off. But they will have 20$ next time. You will give them 10$ material and keep the other 10 for their loan.
How they got the money, you don’t ask. Customer service even in drug business is the key to long term success.
And sometimes people who went to jail come back months later, because they hit big and they can afford to pay back that 16$ that you never thought you will see again… and then spend more money that you didn’t think they had.

I have one example of a rich person who was addicted to drugs.

He was a gifted child so his parents treated him like he knew how to raise himself. They also probably weren’t terribly interested in raising a child, so they basically abandoned him. He was cared for, but not by them.

Best example of this: I mentioned that I still remembered my mom teaching me how to tie my shoes. He remembered the maid teaching him.

Because no one would stop him, he started drinking in his early teens, and moved onto drugs soon after.

Regarding murdering because of money, I’d recommend making it a home invasion gone wrong. Addicted kid gets cut off from family, can’t pay drug dealer, can’t get drugs. Tells drug dealer he knows where the family keeps a lot of money. Like “won the lottery” money. Drug dealer tells someone else who convinces them to go after it. Hilarity ensues.

Rich people do get addicted to drugs.

The unrealistic part is the fanily being killed because they can’t pay.

Why can’t they pay? I thought they were rich? And a drug dealer isnt going to kill the only people who could conceivably pay him.

Yes, 100%. Fancy rehab clinics are there literally for this reason. The Betty Ford Clinic was a punchline for a long time as being a brand-name Hollywood-friendly rehab that specialized in keeping their client list quiet. The kids of wealthy people can and do get addicted to drugs - cocaine in college would be an easy one.

I agree that it’s entirely unrealistic that a dealer would kill a family over money. A dealer would sooner blackmail the family, or threaten to harm the kid via “some associates.” If the dealer kills the family…how would they get money? The point of leveraging fear to get paid is that 1) someone needs to remain alive and afraid of something worse so they have a reason to pay someone to stop things getting worse, and 2) sending a message that other people will see that someone needs to get paid or there will be consequences. Plus, any drug-addicted 20-something will crumple up and be totally useless in this situation, rather than get sober AND get revenge.

Just throwing an idea out there - let’s say 20-something guy has a younger sister So we have 20, Dealer, and Sister for your setup. Maybe Loved One is a family member with skills the parents don’t have. 20 owes a ton of money to Dealer. 20 goes to Dealer’s place trying to score something and is already messed up and Dealer is about to throw them out, but 20’s phone rings. It’s Sister sending a message. Dealer gets interested, steals 20’s phone, and starts to run a scam on Sister. Dealer get Sister into way deeper shit. Parents are useless and have no idea what to do, but cut off money to both of them. 20 goes looking for Sister, who is found dead from an OD. Or ODs and goes to a hospital, but is pregnant with Dealer’s baby, or mangled in a car accident where Dealer was driving and Dealer was fine - whatever you want (please don’t get too misogynistic with it). 20/Loved One goes after Dealer for revenge, but it makes more sense for 20 at minimum because we’re invested in 20. You can only add Loved One if you introduce them as somehow “better” than 20, and more skilled.

Simply getting cut off from money is a pretty trite reason to get revenge because it will seem like it’s only about money, not the emotional connection with the family. When you add the Sister as the catalyst, 20 will feel guilt over being the way that Dealer gets their hooks into a family member, the parents will be helpless, so 20 or someone else will feel the need to act since no one else can. Though, this might be a very done to death plot.

I grew up a middle class kid in the rich suburbs. That’s so realistic and common it’s practically cliche.

The only realistic part is the rich parents not making the kid out when it really came down to it. You don’t hear about it more because Rich parents get their kids out of drug issues and DUIs like the rest of us run errands on a Tuesday night.

Elon is addicted to ketamine.

Not to mention all the celebrities who have OD’d throughout the ages.

If they were some kind of nepobaby and just given everything in life without having to work for it, it would be fairly realistic that they may not have the ability to make money of their own quickly enough to satisfy their dealer.

A lot of kids who grow up rich grow up bored, seeking ways to not be bored. When you can afford pretty much anything and you’re surrounded by people who promise to give you something new and exciting, it’s easy to get addicted.

To drugs. To booze. Sex. To adrenaline. And people are willing to provide all of it.

The unrealistic part is the drug dealer killing his user. It’s business. Killing your customers coz they got cut off is bad for business. Especially when the families are wealthy enough to buy their own justice.

Before it ever gets that far, though, the family probably pays off the drug dealer and lets them know there’s no more money there. The dealer might not cut them off, but they’re certainly not trusting that the addict is “good for it.”

Even if the dealer was that stupid, to let that debt large enough… there’s other ways they can pay. Access. Contacts. Information. Dirt.

Why wouldn’t they?