A Madness Called Meth: Chapter Five B

WALKING A FINE LINE

Former Meth Worker Balances Between Drug Dealers And Law Enforcement

A van with tinted passenger windows glides into the vacant parking lot
behind a roadside hotel in Turlock. At 10 a.m. sharp, its side door scrolls
open.

The rules of the interview: No name, no hometown, no details. Sit inside
the van. You have an hour. The van door closes. Two agents from the state
Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement monitor the questions and answers.

The informant sits in the dark. Jesus Christ on a gold cross presses into
his shirt. His hands are soft, his nails clean. Pressed blue jeans and a
sports shirt belie his former work as a ranch hand. That work, he says, was
long ago. Now, he buoys precariously between drug agents and drug
traffickers - his former colleagues.

He left the state of Michoacan, Mexico, to come El Norte, a land with
better opportunities, better work, better pay. He arrived in a Central
Valley dust-bowl town, surrounded by almond orchards, peach trees and cow
pastures. He was 17 and alone.

He worked on a dairy farm, tending cows and acres of sun-dried ranch land.
It was hard work, he says, and low pay. He sent money to his family in Mexico.

One night a few friends from his hometown invited him to an apartment to
meet some people, to talk business. It was a short conversation. Two men
flashed sticky wads of dollar bills wrapped in rubber bands, and told him
he could make more money in one day doing what they did than what he could
make in a month on the farm.

The job, they said, is easy. We get the drugs. You sell.

The teen-ager was a good worker. Someone, he doesn't know who, arranged a
meeting with the boss. The boss, he says, is well-connected on both sides
of the border and presents himself as a polished professional. He takes
care of his employees, offering them meals, cars, places to stay and places
to play. More importantly, he offers them work.

When he got the call, he "worked." He would pick up the product - about 2
pounds of meth -- and deliver it to a specified location. Three regulars
would dole out the meth to street dealers. In less than three hours, the
informant says he made $500.

He would make an additional $300 for cleaning a meth lab after a cook -
rinsing flasks and buckets, discarding trash. He could earn an extra $200
for cleaning the boss' home, and another $400 for completing various
errands before a cook - gathering lab equipment, trash bags and sheets. He
watched the cooks, learned the process. He once saw 60 pounds of meth
produced during one cook, but typically, he says, the crews would
manufacture about 30 pounds.

He says he never became a cook, or cared to sample the "dirty drug." Today,
he loiters around some labs, and answers anonymous calls to deliver dope.
But now, he works under the watchful eye of law enforcement.

The agent in the front passenger seat turns around.

"Time is almost up."

The informant mentions family.

He often calls his parents in Michoacan to tell them not to worry. Life is
good, work is fine, he tells them.

"They don't know what I do here. I tell them I'm working on a ranch, 8 or 9
hours a day. And they tell me, 'Please look for a clean job.'"

Chapter 6, http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00/n1502/a03.html