Pubdate: Thu, 16 Jun 2005
Source: Columbia Missourian (MO)
Copyright: 2005 Columbia Missourian
Contact:  http://www.columbiamissourian.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2282
Author: Colin Planalp

BLUNT SIGNS BILL TO CURB METH LABS

The law puts some products used to make meth behind counters.

About a year after the Oklahoma pseudoephedrine law passed, Tulsa police are
able to spend more time doing criminal investigations and less time rushing
from one meth lab to another, Officer Scott Walton said.

"It has freed up officers and narcotics officers to go about and do the jobs
they are assigned to do, instead of the burdensome task of cleaning up meth
labs," he said.

In 2003, before Oklahoma's law to put pseudoephedrine pills behind pharmacy
counters was passed, the state seized 1,233 meth labs. Last year, after the
bill was signed, Oklahoma seized 812 labs.

In Missouri last year, 2,788 meth labs were seized, the most in the United
States.

So on Wednesday Gov. Matt Blunt did the same thing as Oklahoma by signing a
bill into law that requires certain pseudoephedrine products to be kept
behind pharmaceutical counters.

This bill "will let us do what Oklahoma has, and stop this crisis," said
Missouri Rep. Bob Behnen, R-Kirksville, sponsor of the bill.

Behnen said the bill is modeled after an Oklahoma law, which was passed in
April 2004 and was the first of its kind in the country.

"We called them after they implemented the bill and asked them if they would
do anything differently," Behnen said.

Missouri Highway Patrol crime analyst Connie Farrow said Boone County had 21
meth lab incidents in 2004. Maj. Tom Reddin of the Boone County Sheriff's
Department said meth labs are a major problem in Boone County but he is not
sure how the new law will affect production.

"How positive or how significant remains to be seen," he said. "But it is
certainly a step in the right direction."

Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs Control spokesman, Mark
Woodward, said the law in Oklahoma had a tremendous affect on
methamphetamine producers.

"We literally saw a 40 percent drop in the first month," he said. "There has
been about a 70 to 80 percent drop (in methamphetamine labs) statewide."

In 2003, Oklahoma spent $4.9 million to dispose of hazardous materials from
methamphetamine labs. Since the law was passed they have saved 80 percent in
disposal fees, Woodward said.

When legislators wrote the law for Missouri, representatives from the
Oklahoma bureau came to Missouri to help draft the new legislation.

Several states, including Kansas, Illinois, Arkansas and Iowa, were
interested in the Oklahoma law.

After Oklahoma passed its law, meth producers would drive to neighboring
states to buy their pseudoephedrine pills, said Lonnie Wright, director of
the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs Control.

Kansas, Arkansas, Iowa and Illinois have since enacted similar laws to
regulate the sale of pseudoephedrine.

"We have watched meth labs go down steadily," Wright said.

Oklahoma police seized 121 meth labs in January 2004, before the law was
passed. In May 2005, more than a year after the law passed, they seized six,
he said.

As a conservative estimate, Oklahoma has saved $350 million a year because
of the law, Wright said.

"It didn't cost the state a nickel," he said. "We are putting hundreds of
millions of dollars back in our pockets." 
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MAP posted-by: Josh