METH LAYS SIEGE TO INDIAN COUNTRY

To Fight Drug, Tribes Try 'Just About Everything'

SAN CARLOS APACHE INDIAN RESERVATION, Ariz. -- Something haunts the
Dudley house atop a ruddy clay mesa in Apache country.

It is the memory of a young man, David Justin Jackson Dudley, beaten
to death at a January 2005 methamphetamine and booze party on the reservation.

The entryway is a photographic shrine to the 20-year-old, who wanted
to be an X-ray technician.

"We just kind of made it David's wall," explains the young man's
father, Dennis Dudley. "We light candles every time we come home."

Mary Jane Dudley sits in the living room, surrounded by half-finished
Apache baskets. For months after David died, she could not weave.
Now, she performs the ancient craft to lose herself in memories.
"From the time I wake up to the time I go to bed is when I think
about him," she says. "I haven't stopped crying."

Police reports and court records say David Dudley was punched, kicked
and bashed with a bottle. His killers dragged him into a wash and
left him naked to die.

Dennis Dudley blames meth. He walks outside to a front-yard ramada.
Beneath the roof, a large mound of dirt is covered with silk flowers.

"I didn't know where to put him, so we buried him out here," Dudley
whispers. "We put this here to remind the community there has to be
something done against drugs. If David had died in a car crash, maybe
we could get over it. But with him dying this way, it's so hard."

Like an evil spirit, meth is sweeping through Indian country, tearing
families apart and leaving a trail of violence and tears.

The highly addictive stimulant produces euphoria, increased alertness
and increased physical activity when snorted, swallowed, injected or
smoked. The drug can be manufactured using ingredients purchased in
local stores. Over-the-counter cold medicines containing ephedrine or
pseudoephedrine and other materials are "cooked" to make meth.

Native American leaders nationwide -- but especially in the West --
report a meth-induced surge of domestic violence, juvenile sex and
meth-addicted babies, while federal authorities say foreign drug
cartels are targeting tribal lands as distribution beachheads.

Just this month, a Native American-oriented website, Indianz.com,
reported that meth was "the single biggest issue discussed among
tribal leaders" during a February meeting of the National Congress of
American Indians.

From the Lummi Nation in Washington to the Cherokee in North
Carolina, "glass" has become public enemy No. 1 for many tribal leaders.

"Just about everything possible is being done to attack this
problem," said Eric Pritchett, police chief on the Cherokee
reservation, who recently put 30 officers through a drug interdiction
training program.

At a February hearing of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, Kathy
Kitcheyan, chairwoman of the San Carlos Apache community where David
Dudley lived and died, put it this way: "Status quo is a life six
years shorter than any other American group, being 318% more likely
to die from diabetes and 670% more likely to die from alcoholism.

"It's 63 babies born in my tribe last year addicted to
methamphetamine, and this is just one tribe. Nationally, Indian
country is under attack from crystal meth."

The Indian Affairs Committee will return to the topic of meth April 5
when Chairman John McCain, R-Ariz., convenes a hearing on the issue.

The meth wildfire flared onto indigenous enclaves so fast and
recently that little comprehensive data are available. But anecdotes abound:

. In North Carolina last year, the Cherokees launched a multipronged
attack on meth by regulating sales of ephedrine drug products,
starting a hotline for people to report drug dealers, developing a
new treatment program and conducting anti-drug rallies.

. New Mexico's Ohkay Owingeh tribe, also known as San Juan Pueblo, is
reviving the practice of banishment to remove meth dealers' tribal
membership, as has Washington's Lummi Nation.

. Arizona's Apaches, like many other tribes, have launched public
education blitzes and passed statutes to criminalize meth, which was
not even listed as an illegal drug under arcane tribal codes.

. Navajo Nation police arrested an 81-year-old grandmother, her
63-year-old daughter and 39-year-old granddaughter Tuesday on
suspicion of dealing meth in the tribal community of Dilkon, Ariz.

. At the Gila River Indian Community near Phoenix, counselors oversee
"talking circles" where addicts pass an eagle feather around during therapy.

. At Wyoming's Wind River Reservation, 25 tribal members were
arrested by Bureau of Indian Affairs and Drug Enforcement
Administration agents last May in connection with a drug ring that
did 100 deals a day out of a single home, according to Jeffrey
Sweetin, special agent in charge of the DEA's Denver office.

Sweetin says Shoshone and Arapaho youth are prey on a reservation
afflicted by isolation, ennui and limited enforcement.

"We had an organization headed by Mexican drug traffickers who
specifically targeted the Wind River reservation," Sweetin says.
"Young kids get free dope, and after a few times they'll grow into a
user population. ... There's an entire generation of Native Americans
vanishing."

Social Services director Terry Ross of the San Carlos Apache
community says meth abuse is part of larger pathology: Unemployment
is 82%, public assistance funds are dwindling and there is no
residential treatment program.

Because of meth's low price and enduring high, some tribal leaders
say it has surpassed alcohol as the drug of choice among teens. And
that worries Ross. "I don't think we even know what we're dealing
with," Ross says. "What will meth bring to us in 10 years?"