ROLLING RELIEF FOR METH'S INNOCENT YOUNG VICTIMS

Tom Salisbury has seen children stripped naked in their frontyards,
hosed down to cleanse them of dangerous chemicals, swaddled in towels
and held in squad cars to wait as their parents were led away in handcuffs.

An investigator with the Riverside County Sheriff's Department,
Salisbury knows firsthand how traumatic busting a home-based
methamphetamine lab can be on the children who happen to live there.

That's why he, in partnership with Perris businessman John Barnes,
began an effort to create a fleet of four county-owned recreational
vehicles specially outfitted to provide a refuge for the children
caught in the middle of the Inland Empire's meth trade.

"I just wanted to provide a safe haven for them," said Barnes, who
helped raise $30,000 to buy the county's first such vehicle.

Filled with new clothes, toys, snacks, videos and DVDs, the
"community resource vehicles" will offer children privacy and
distraction during the investigation and decontamination process
following the arrest of parents or other relatives. One vehicle has
just been unveiled; the others are being prepared.

Salisbury, who has witnessed between 1,000 and 2,000 meth lab raids
involving children in the last seven years, said he "wanted to come
up with a way to reduce the trauma inflicted on those children."
While Inland Empire meth busts have decreased in recent years,
authorities say the area remains a center of production, with nearly
200 labs raided in Riverside and San Bernardino counties last year.

In many cases, kids at home labs live in squalor among toxic and
highly explosive meth byproducts, feces-stained blankets and kitchens
filled with rotting food and maggots, Salisbury said, recalling some
of the worst conditions he has seen. Some accidentally ingest toxic
substances, like the water-bottle full of meth-laced fluid one
7-year-old boy drank, Salisbury said. After three gulps, he vomited
and was eventually fine.

"Most places, we didn't even want to be inside, yet these kids were
living there for extended periods," he said.

A camping trip with his three children inspired Salisbury's RV idea.
It can take as long as 12 hours for children to be re-housed and
provided with medical care after a meth bust, Salisbury said. Often,
all of their chemically tainted toys, clothes and other possessions
must be destroyed.

"These children are all victims of the poor choices that were made by
their parents," said Riverside County Supervisor Marion Ashley, who
helped Barnes with the fundraising. "They shouldn't have to pay for it."

The first 24-foot RV, designed under Salisbury's direction by
Fleetwood RV, has a combination playpen-crib in place of a stove,
cabinets stocked with juice, formula and cookies and stuffed dogs and
bears scattered on tables and chairs. The bathroom includes a shower
and tub for bathing children, plus drawers full of clothing and
socks. In place of a rear bedroom is an interview area, with
recording equipment for deputies and social services officials.

"Every kid deserves a chance to be in something like these mobile
safe havens," said Salisbury, who believes the vehicles are the first
of their kind in the nation. Eventually, RVs will be based in Perris,
Jurupa, Indio and Temecula, and can pull double duty at sobriety
checkpoints, child abuse investigations and as sheriff's command centers.

Barnes, moved by a 2004 presentation Salisbury made to the Perris
Rotary Club on the social impact of meth, organized fundraisers
starting early last year. The county bought three additional RVs with
$186,000 in federal grant money secured by Theresa A. Larsen,
executive director of Prevent Child Abuse Riverside County.

"These kids are just so damaged anyway, and they're living in such
filth," said Larsen, whose organization will solicit donations to
keep the fleet stocked and gather statistical data on the RVs' use.

The Sheriff's Department will operate and maintain the vehicles - a
"kinder, softer, gentler way of handling" some of the often
overlooked victims of the county's meth industry, Ashley said.