Pubdate: Mon, 27 Dec 2004
Source: Courier-Journal, The (KY)
Copyright: 2004 The Courier-Journal
Contact:  http://www.courier-journal.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/97
Note: does not publish LTEs from outside their circulation area
Author: Laura Bauer and Harold Adams

Series: Meth - A Rising Blight (Part 2A)

KENTUCKY, INDIANA SLOW TO REACT TO GROWING THREAT

Other States Had Already Limited Drug Ingredients

Eleven states, including Missouri and Illinois, limit how much cold and 
allergy medicine customers can buy, tightening access to the key chemical 
for making meth.

But not Kentucky or Indiana.

Oklahoma and Oregon this year began requiring customers to provide 
identification and sign a log before they buy cold and allergy drugs that 
contain the chemical pseudoephedrine.

But not Kentucky or Indiana.

And last year, Missouri cut the number of medicine packages that customers 
can buy to two per visit, from three.

But Kentucky and Indiana do not regulate the purchase of these medications 
at retail stores, although many limit sales voluntarily.

Experts say Kentucky and Indiana have failed to keep pace with other states 
that have found controlling meth's necessary ingredient is the best way to 
staunch the drug's spread.

Officials from the two states said they have not been ignoring the 
methamphetamine problem.

Instead, they focused on toughening laws for possession and manufacturing.

Kentucky legislators, for instance, passed a law in 2002 that made it a 
felony to possess more than 24 grams of pseudoephedrine with the intent to 
manufacture. A clerk could be charged with a crime for selling the 
medication knowing it would be used to make meth.

"I think we acted quickly making these penalties harsh for anybody," said 
Kentucky Sen. Dan Kelly, R-Springfield, who is the majority floor leader 
and a lawyer with clients battling meth addiction.

"I don't think the problem was too slow of a response. I don't think it was 
an appropriate response. But a lot of that comes from experience," Kelly 
said. "Until you know what you're dealing with, you don't realize," he said.

Indiana House Speaker Brian Bosma, R-Indianapolis, said his state's efforts 
also focused largely on enforcement. "And that's appropriately so," he 
said, adding, however, that, "We're looking to alternatives in addition to 
traditional enforcement to curtail the proliferation."

Scott Rowland, chief counsel to the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics, said his 
state learned through disaster that arresting people or educating children 
is not enough. "Whenever the meth epidemic comes to a state, as long as 
pseudoephedrine is readily available, you are going to have meth labs," 
Rowland said. "The less you control pseudoephedrine, the greater your meth 
problem is going to be. "A lot of people call for education. But who are 
you going to educate? Are you going to tell the cranksters they shouldn't 
cook dope and use it?"

Other Concerns

Limiting Cold Pills Could Create Other Problems

Last week, Pfizer Inc. reacted to concern about the meth scourge, 
announcing it will offer a new version of its cold and allergy medicine 
Sudafed without pseudoephedrine. Pfizer also will continue to offer the old 
Sudafed.

As Indiana lawmakers study other states' laws limiting pseudoephedrine, 
they say they are wary of infringing on the public's ability to buy cold 
and allergy medications, and they wonder about other effects.

"It may have the unintended consequence of increasing the number of 
break-ins, which is also a way that they obtain the precursors for making 
meth," said Rep. Eric Koch, R-Bedford.

Koch is an assistant majority whip in the Indiana House of Representatives 
and was the leading Republican sponsor of the bill that created the meth 
task force.

Still, Bosma said, "I think we have to look at that option and consider it 
strongly."

Vigo County Sheriff John Marvel, a task force member, said he is not sure 
such a law would be a cure because meth addicts might travel to states 
without such restrictions.

"All my meth heads have to do is get in the car and drive 10 minutes (to 
Illinois), and they've got the product again," said Marvel, referring to 
the ingredients.

Trooper Pete Norwood, a spokesman for the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, said 
that's happening in his state. "They're going across state lines buying a 
mass quantity of the product," he said.

Missouri has led the nation in the number of meth lab seizures since the 
late 1990s. Last year, the state limited the number of boxes of 
pseudoephedrine a person can buy at a time to two.

"We've been able to stop people at a much earlier level," said Troy 
Leavitt, the former metro methamphetamine prosecutor in the Kansas City area.

The Loopholes

Meth Cooks Shop Around To Subvert State Limits

But Missouri's law has not worked perfectly. Cooks send people to several 
stores to shop, Leavitt said. Because of that, Missouri also is looking at 
adopting the Oklahoma law requiring a log of purchases.

Russell Moore exploited the sales loophole when he was making meth. He 
would shop at department and drugstores across Southern Kentucky, buying 
only a few boxes of cold and allergy pills here and there, but not enough 
to draw attention.

In about four hours he could buy enough of the key meth ingredient for 
about 50 grams of the drug, which could keep a person high for about 200 
hours. Then he would go about cooking, he said.

Three years ago, Moore was caught with several ingredients, including 
"about 20 packs of pills." He was charged with intent to manufacture 
methamphetamine, served six months in county jail and completed a treatment 
program as part of a plea deal.

Moore, of Todd County, will be on probation until 2006.

Moore, three months into sobriety, marvels that Kentucky has not learned 
that the key to controlling meth is controlling pseudoephedrine or ephedrine.

He said, "They really need to tighten the laws, so this stuff isn't so easy 
to get."
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MAP posted-by: Beth