Pubdate: Thu, 23 Aug 2001
Source: Gadsden Times, The (AL)
Copyright: 2001 The Gadsden Times
Contact:  http://www.gadsdentimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1203
Author: Darrell Norman

METH'S DOUBLE DANGER

RAINSVILLE - Methamphetamine, a drug the Nazis developed in World War II to 
keep soldiers alert and aggressive, is the fastest-growing illegal drug in 
Alabama.

Law enforcement officers from all over north Alabama and as far away as 
Bayou La Batre gathered Wednesday at Northeast Alabama State Community 
College to learn more about how the drug is made and what danger it poses.

The message was that methamphetamine is not only highly addictive for those 
who use it, but also extremely hazardous for those who make it and agents 
who close down their homemade labs.

It was the first meeting of the newly formed Alabama Methamphetamine 
Laboratory Eradication Task Force. Members who attended were Sen. Lowell 
Barron, D-Fyffe, Rep. Ronald Johnson, R-Talladega, Rep. John Robinson, 
D-Scottsboro and Bob Lusk, Gov. Don Siegelman's representative.

District Attorney Mike O'Dell said some veterans brought the recipe for 
meth back from Germany, "cooked" it on the West Coast and spread to other 
parts of the country.

Meth was already widespread in the West by the 1970s, but did not show up 
in north Alabama until much later. It has "exploded" in DeKalb and Jackson 
counties in the past two years, agents said.

Chris Graham, an agent with the DeKalb County Drug Task Force, displayed 
the readily available ingredients that meth cookers need to manufacture the 
drug.

Coleman fuel, Heet, Sudafed, muriatic acid, Drano, iodine, starting fluid, 
coffee filters, peroxide, aluminum foil, plastic tubing and common canning 
jars were among the items.

One manufacturing method requires red phosphorus, which meth cooks get by 
dissolving hundreds of striker plates from book matches in nail polish remover.

Others buy batteries in large quantities, from which they extract lithium. 
Instructions for making meth are readily available.

The Wal-Mart in Fort Payne has voluntarily removed Ephedrine products from 
its shelves, and sells them in limited quantities on request, O'Dell said.

The chemical combine is such a witch's brew that experienced officers can 
find meth labs by smell alone.

One of the first meth labs found in the area was in Sand Rock, near the 
school. It was in the kitchen of a "pharmacist from Georgia gone bad," said 
Mark Hopwood of the state forensics laboratory in Jacksonville.

But a kitchen is not needed. Agents have found labs in duffel bags, 
backpacks, abandoned houses, buses and pickup trucks. In DeKalb County, 
dogs dragged 12 backpacks filled with meth-making chemicals and equipment 
from woods where they had been dumped.

The ordinary ingredients needed to make meth can become lethal when 
combined - flammable, explosive and toxic when inhaled.

At least three women have been seriously burned in DeKalb County when meth 
labs blew up.

Chief Investigator Chuck Phillips of the Jackson County Sheriff's 
Department gave an example of the danger meth labs pose even to firefighters.

A vacant house that agents believe was used as a meth lab burned, and the 
lid on the septic tank blew off - the result, officers think, of chemicals 
being dumped down the drain.

Every meth lab must be treated as a hazardous materials site, and cleaning 
up a "pickup size" lab can cost from $3,500 to $6,000, Graham said.

Graham is in high demand as one of only three or four agents in north 
Alabama certified by the Drug Enforcement Agency to clean up meth labs.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration has levied fines of tens 
of thousands of dollars on officers who entered meth labs without the DEA 
certification.

Agents appealed to the legislators present for money to pay for training 
and specialized equipment - such as hazardous material clothing, masks and 
helmets - without which they cannot fight the meth problem.

Illicit meth cookers themselves pose a danger. The drug makes them highly 
irritable and paranoid, and many of them equip their labs with automatic 
weapons and sophisticated security equipment, Hopwood said.

He said one man was found to be making meth after his neighbors complained 
of his running a weed trimmer in the middle of the night. Agents learned 
that he had been making and using meth and had not slept for two weeks.

The Meth Task Force's primary mission is to gather facts to develop tougher 
legislation to punish those who manufacture the drug.

Although many are involved in meth trafficking, most are making the drug to 
feed their own habit, and unless agents can prove they are making it to 
sell, these "personal use" meth cookers slip through the current law 
against manufacturing the drug.

"It used to be that a few people had a lot of drugs," Graham said. "Now, 
with meth, a lot of people have a little drugs."

"This is a different drug problem," O'Dell said. "It will take a different 
approach."

The legislation now being drafted would eliminate the personal-use 
exception, and O'Dell said he wants enhanced penalties for "making or 
possessing the drug near churches, schools and housing projects."

The second meeting of the Meth Task Force will be Monday in Andalusia. 
Other meetings will be held around the state.
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