RIMERSBURG, Pa. -- One night a few months ago, Spencer Leroy Varner went out with a friend, snorted heroin, came home and went to bed.

He never woke up.

His aunt, Karen Davis, found him dead the next morning.

She and her husband, Dana Davis, who own a bakery and a golf course in Clarion County, had taken him into their spacious home last year to try to save him from a life of drugs.

One of the conditions of his living there was submitting to regular urine tests overseen by Karen Davis, the tough-love coach of the Union High School boys' basketball team.

But none of it helped.

The skinny 19-year-old everyone called "Whitey" died of an overdose, another casualty in a rural county beset with heroin from the streets of Pittsburgh.

"It's no secret that he had a drug problem -- he was living here because he had a drug problem," said Mr. Davis, 49, who had battles with his son, Colton, over his partying before he died in a 2007 motorcycle crash. He was 19, like Spencer.

The wreck was not related to substance abuse, but Colton Davis had been headed down the same path to oblivion that claimed his cousin.

"You're not going to help someone who doesn't want to help themselves," Mr. Davis said. "I don't know what it will take to wake these kids up, to make them not want to die."

Since Spencer Varner's death on Dec. 3, at least four other young people from southern Clarion County have overdosed. One died: Johnathan Biondo, 24, of East Brady, who was found dead on his couch Feb. 9.

Compared to the heroin scourge in metro areas, five overdoses in three months is hardly overwhelming. In Allegheny County, by comparison, 32 people died from abusing heroin or heroin in combination with other drugs in 2007, the latest year for which statistics are available.

But in a small county like Clarion, population 43,000, it's enough to set off alarms.

Police have met with students at schools. The mayor of Rimersburg held a special community meeting last week. A local Christian community group is even erecting bulletin boards, signed "Jesus," ordering Satan to "get your drugs out of southern Clarion County."

State troopers, known for issuing bare-bones news releases, also took the unusual step two weeks ago of putting out an alert pleading for cooperation.

Sgt. Frank Wolbert wrote that a "call to act is upon us" after troopers had responded to four overdoses in a week.

"Law enforcement efforts to deal with the problem have been met with resistance by those involved and those who choose not to get involved," he wrote. "We are issuing a law enforcement caution for all heroin users. Be smart, get help."

Heroin in these hinterlands is nothing new. Wayne Meier, 52, owner of Paul's Market in Sligo, population 700, said kids would come into his store a few years ago "looking like zombies."

"I don't see that as much now, but I guess they are using elsewhere in the county," he said. "It's cheap, and the kids have access to it."

In a tight community where generations of families have grown up with each other, word gets around quickly when someone overdoses.

Jenny Barger, 20, the mayor of Sligo, knew both Spencer Varner and Matthew Grube, another 19-year-old from Rimersburg who recently overdosed. She said she was baby sitting when she heard what happened to Matt.

"I'm sitting there thinking, 'Please don't let him die,'" she said. "It's definitely gotten worse, just in the last year."

Mr. Grube was lucky. His father found him in time to resuscitate him. But police and the district attorney's office are worried that the next user won't be as fortunate.

In 2007, state police handled four heroin-related offenses in the county. In 2008, the number spiked to 23, plus another six cases handled by the Clarion County Narcotics Task Force.

"We just don't want to keep seeing these young people dying," said Cpl. Will Myers of the Clarion barracks.

Police have had their successes.

In January they arrested Cody Stewart, 20, on charges of selling heroin stamp bags to confidential informants for a few hundred dollars. When officers searched his house, they said they also found 20 marijuana plants, drug paraphernalia and two loaded guns.

Cody Stewart is another Rimersburg boy everyone knew; he was once friends with Colton Davis and took vacations with his family.

"You raise them and they're all together," said Dana Davis, "and then you see them fall apart."

Mr. Stewart is awaiting trial.

But police say busting others for dealing has been difficult because users aren't talking.

Troopers have been frustrated on other fronts, too.

The influx of heroin has led to an increase in property crimes as addicts steal to feed their habit.

At the same time, police can't identify a focal point for the drug trade. In rural counties, universities are sometimes the center of drug deals. But Clarion University appears to have no connection with the recent overdoses, police said.

Nor does there appear to be an organized ring at work.

Instead, lots of small-time dealers from Rimersburg and other small, poor towns in the southern end of the county are driving to Pittsburgh and its suburbs for their supply.

Police and narcotics agents from the state attorney general's office say Clarion dealers make their drug buys in three specific areas: the North Side, Braddock and New Kensington. Access to those neighborhoods is easy along Interstate 279 and Route 28, dubbed by investigators "Heroin Highway."

"We've been hearing [about] New Kensington for quite a long time," said District Attorney Mark Aaron.

The nature of the heroin has been a problem. In addition to the low price -- $25 for a stamp bag -- it's especially potent.

State police have tested batches from two overdoses, including Mr. Grube's, looking for such toxic agents as the fentanyl that killed hundreds nationwide in 2006. Nothing extraordinary turned up.

But tests did reveal that this dope is 60 percent to 70 percent pure.

"We're dealing with a whole new ball game," Mr. Aaron said. "People have to realize that kids in that age group are famous for taking risks. But with the potency now, one night of experimenting and it can be all over. The first time could be the last time."

Dec. 2 wasn't Spencer Varner's first time. His family said he was a regular cocaine user but had also used heroin.

The Davises tried to help him escape that life and a history of family problems. After his parents divorced in 2001, he lived for a time with his mother, Kim Rupp, and his siblings before moving back in 2007 with his father, Rob Varner, a funeral director in Sligo.

But while Mr. Varner's older son, Shane, was in jail on a probation violation related to a drunk-driving offense, Spencer used his brother's ATM code to withdraw $6,000 to buy drugs.

That led to a series of disputes that ended with Spencer moving out and ultimately filing a protection-from-abuse complaint against his father.

Kim Rupp and her sister, Karen Davis, felt it was best for him to move in with the Davises.

"It was easier for him," said Kim Rupp. "We still had two younger kids in the house. It was simpler."

But even in a stable home, some kids make it and some don't.

Karen and Dana Davis have a son, Austin, 15, who gets straight A's. Another son, Devin, is 21 and majoring in pharmacy at Duquesne University. An adopted daughter, Penny, 34, graduated from Carnegie Mellon University and is now a computer programmer in California and a referee for college and professional basketball games.

But Colton was always different. He was a "hellion," his father said, and Spencer was cast in the same mold. The cousins seemed to drift through life without much sense of purpose.

"You'd look into their eyes," said Mrs. Davis, "and they seemed lost."

There were other parallels. Spencer drove his cousin's yellow pickup, emblazoned with "In Memory of 425" -- Colton's motorcycle racing number and his birthday.

Colton once totaled that truck. After it was rebuilt, Spencer dinged it up more than once. The night before he died, his uncle said, he smashed it into a woman's mailbox.

Spencer, like Colton, never thought anything would happen to him.

The Davises said they tried their best to straighten him out.

Devin was particularly blunt, cursing at his cousin for dabbling in dope and warning him away from it.

Spencer tested positive for drugs only once, a few months after moving in with the Davis family. After that he seemed to get his act together.

"He bragged to his friends that he was doing so well," said Mr. Davis.

It all went haywire on the night of Dec. 2. The Davises later learned that he and a friend drove to Clarion and had a few beers. Then they drove to East Brady, where Spencer withdrew money from an ATM to buy dope. After snorting it, he drove home and went to bed sometime after midnight.

His alarm was set for 5:30 a.m. because he wanted to go hunting.

When Mrs. Davis heard it ringing, she opened his door to check on him. Rigor mortis had already set in.

Sitting at their dining room table last week, surrounded by pictures of their children and their nephew, the Davises fought through grief to deliver a message.

"These kids need to know what it was like to walk in and find Spencer like that," Mrs. Davis said as tears rolled down her cheeks. "I wish I would have encouraged him more to go to a treatment center. But I couldn't make him."

Mr. Davis hung his head.

"I feel like a total failure," he said. "I feel like I let him and his family down."

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Correction/Clarification: (Published Mar. 3, 2009) Shane Varner was jailed on a probation violation related to a drunken-driving conviction after he admitted to his probation officer in 2007 that he had been using cocaine. This story as originally published Mar. 1, 2009 about heroin use in Clarion County incorrectly said the underlying offense was a drug conviction.