Pubdate: Sat, 17 Jun 2006 Source: Ukiah Daily Journal, The (CA) Copyright: 2006 The Ukiah Daily Journal Contact: http://www.ukiahdailyjournal.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/581 Author: Ben Brown Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine) REPORT ON METH DISPUTED LOCALLY Methamphetamine is not the epidemic politicians and the media claim it to be, according to a report from the Sentencing Project. But, officials in the Mendocino County Sheriff's Office say the drug is a significant problem locally. "Mischaracterizing the impact of methamphetamine by exaggerating its prevalence and consequences while downplaying its receptivity to treatment succeeds neither as a tool of prevention nor as a vehicle of education," wrote analyst Ryan King in his report. The report compiled statistics from government studies performed in 2004 that show that 583,000 people, or less than two-tenths of 1 percent of the U.S. population, had used methamphetamine in the last month. By contrast, four times as many people regularly use cocaine and 30 times as many use marijuana, the report said. "Nationally that may be true, but in Mendocino County it's the opposite," Commander Bob Nishiyama of the Mendocino County Major Crimes Task Force said of the report's findings. A separate government survey highlighted in the report showed that methamphetamine use among high school students dropped 36 percent between 2001 and 2005. Overall, use has remained stable since 1999, according to the report. Nishiyama said the creation, sale and use of methamphetamine appears to be on the rise in Mendocino County. He said many of the people arrested in the county have some amount of methamphetamine in their system and that there is a direct correlation between methamphetamine use in this county and rates of domestic violence and other violence crimes. Nishiyama said he thought the report was self-serving and did not put a lot of faith in its validity. The Sentencing Project is a nonprofit organization that supports alternatives to incarceration for convicted drug users and other criminals. The report acknowledged that methamphetamine use is more widespread than it was 10 years ago, but stated that data from the jail system shows methamphetamine to be a "highly localized" problem. Data collected from jails showed that in five cities in the Western United States, the percentage of suspects who tested positive for methamphetamine was more than 25 percent, according to the report. Three of those cities -- San Diego, Los Angeles and San Jose -- are in California. Nationally, only 5 percent of arrested suspects tested positive for methamphetamine, compared to 30 percent who tested positive for cocaine and 44 percent who tested positive for marijuana, according to the report. "This is where it all got started," Nishiyama said. "California has led the rest of the country in meth labs, but the rest of the country is catching up." In San Francisco, gangs have turned from selling crack-cocaine to selling methamphetamine "because there's more money in it," Nishiyama said. Thefts of pseudoephedrine are also increasing statewide, he said. Currently, California is working on a law that would require anyone who sells medications containing pseudoephedrine, the key ingredient in methamphetamine, to keep those items locked up in the back of the store. It is already illegal for a person to purchase more than three items containing pseudoephedrine from a single store.