Series: Meth: Shattering Lives In Northern Nevada

A three-month Reno Gazette-Journal investigation found that
methamphetamine's grip on the Truckee Meadows has become a stranglehold.

METH AND CRIME GO HAND IN HAND

Burglars, robbers, rapists, carjackers, identity thieves and
murderers -- criminals in the Truckee Meadows almost always have a
meth addiction.

"Most of these criminals are involved in meth," said Lt. Ron Donnelly
of Reno police. "Crime is the only way these cranksters make their
living. Their whole life is built around using and getting meth,
which is what drives them to crime.

"If meth were gone, the crime rate would totally drop. An incredible
amount of crime is attributable to meth."

The exact number of meth-related crimes is unknown, because arrest
charges do not always record an addiction. But anecdotaly, police say
the rise in crime is related because suspects are caught with meth
and its paraphernalia and later confess that they turned to crime to
support their habit.

Meth-related crime in Reno has ranged from an elderly couple murdered
by their 55-year-old son in 2004, their bludgeoned bodies left in the
garage, to a 19-year-old raping and terrorizing women in their homes
near the University of Nevada, Reno in 2005. Last year, a 24-year-old
man shot a Reno police officer in the face because he didn't want to
go to jail for driving a stolen pickup.

In 2000, Carson City Justice of the Peace John Tatro called the death
of a 79-year-old woman "the poster child of the horrible effects of
methamphetamine."

Iris Barton's decomposed body was found in her bedroom about two
months after she died. Her meth-addicted live-in caregiver, Kelly
Hein, was charged with murder but later pleaded guilty to neglect and
exploitation of an elderly person. She had spent more than $38,000 of
Barton's money. Hein, 39, remains on parole.

A career criminal and convicted meth trafficker was spared prison in
2001 after he convinced a Washoe district judge he was tired of
games, gangs and drugs. Three years later he would commit what
authorities called the most heinous crime in Madera County, Calif.,'s history.

Patrick Joseph Booth, violently high on meth, invaded the home of
Darren and Chastity Baker, beat Darren Baker with a baseball bat and
trapped the couple in their bathroom for nearly 24 hours. He forcibly
injected meth into their 11-year-old son. He looted the Bakers' home
and stole their vehicle.

Booth, 36, was arrested in a Reno motel room. He is now in Nevada
prison serving the remaining term of his suspended sentence for
burglary and possessing stolen property. For the Madera invasion, he
got life sentences.

"Meth is an epidemic but it's no excuse for what he did to us,"
Darren Baker said. "People who are on meth are sick. It's a sick drug
and makes you do sick things. What kind of a person would inject meth
into a little boy when he has children of his own?"

Baker said the incident caused his family to move from their home and
to be more suspicious of people.

"I had lived in that house for four years and left the windows open
and unlocked," he said. "There was never any crime where we lived and
then all of a sudden, wham, out of the blue we were attacked."

"He could have robbed us and got out, but he didn't," he said. "Meth
made him do all that crazy stuff."

What disturbs Baker is that he still has no reason why Booth invaded
his home and attacked his family.

"You do brutal stuff on meth," he said. "I feel sorry for those people."

Brandon Douglas Allen was high on meth when he fired a single shot
into the back of his girlfrield's back in 1999 in Sun Valley.

His lawyer, John Oakes, said Allen never meant to kill Kellie Parry.

"He was under the influence of drugs, and he was screwing around with
a gun, and she got shot," Oakes said at the time. "An accident is an accident."

Allen is serving two life terms for the death.

Washoe Drug Court Judge Peter Breen said many of the meth addicts in
his court are jobless, feeding their habit by selling drugs and
committing crimes.

"A meth addict who's good for 25 crimes and then suddenly stops and
gets a job is what we want," Breen said.

Washoe Family Court Judge Francis Doherty said during a press
conference announcing the Meth Commnity Response Alliance group that
meth is a drug of violence.

"It creates unplanned and unmeditated violence," she said. "It's
frightening to digest. It's a drug of crimes, always with an
underlying criminal component that's evident in our jails and in the
lives of our citizens."

Addicts turn to crime

Addicts say meth made them turn to crime to support their habit.

"I couldn't work and meth controlled my entire life," said Tim
Wakeman, a 40-year-old felon who kicked his meth habit in 1998.

Wakeman recalled that evening in 1998 when he decided he'd had
enough. He was at a friend's home using meth, and noticed a woman
next to him had wrapped her baby in newspaper without a diaper. So
they went out in his truck to steal metal to sell at a recycling
plant, a method to get money addicts call scrapping. They got caught
and social workers took the woman's baby away.

"She was screaming and yelling that her baby was taken away and I was
already facing prison time before this ... that was the last day I
used meth," Wakeman said. "Being popped (arrested) again and hearing
that woman screaming was the breaking point."

Wakeman now owns his own business and cherishes being a good father
to his 6-year-old son. But behind him are four divorces, four drunken
driving convictions and fraud and burglary felonies. He has two teen
daughters he barely knows.

He said the residential treatment program at Northstar treatment
center in Reno convinced him to be clean and sober.

"I spent half my life in the bathroom doing drugs and the other half
stealing to try to get it," said Wakeman, who organizes recovery
meetings at Northstar.

"I've seen babies trying to crawl on kitchen floors covered in vomit,
slipping all over the place while their mom was in the bathroom
poking their bodies and mutilating their faces before I ever reached
my breaking point."

"Today I can't even imagine the life I lived," he said. "We hurt
people, we lie and steal from people ... we're just meth zombies.
Meth addiction is an epidemic and it's raising crime levels and ruining lives."