'METH' MOVES EAST

Methamphetamine, a highly addictive stimulant that for years was a concern
in a few Western states, now is being made nationwide in clandestine labs
that are creating environmental hazards and other problems in residential
areas.

California, where methamphetamine first became popular as a recreational
drug in the late 1980s, continues to be the state hit hardest by "meth," or
"speed." In the 12 months that ended Sept. 30, authorities raided 1,262
meth labs in California, more than double the total from the same period
seven years earlier.

Now, authorities are finding meth labs in new places: neighborhoods
throughout the Midwest and the East, where labs packed with the toxic
chemicals used to make the drug have been found in apartment buildings,
duplexes and abandoned buses. In Tennessee, two siblings recently set up a
lab in their grandmother's retirement-home apartment while she was in the
hospital.

"It looks almost like a wildfire moving east," says Dan Salter, an agent at
the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's training academy in Quantico,
Va. Salter teaches law enforcement officers how to recognize and shut down
meth labs, which can emit harmful fumes and must be dismantled carefully to
avoid chemical explosions.

Since the mid-1990s, meth has become particularly popular among young
adults and teenagers seeking cheaper alternatives to cocaine, heroin and
marijuana. Those drugs usually have attracted more attention from law
enforcement.

Meth costs $5 to $15 a dose. It can be made into a pill, a liquid that can
be injected, a powder that can be snorted or a clumpy or rock-like crystal
whose fumes can be inhaled. It is a mix of chemicals found in household
products and fertilizers, and in over-the-counter medicines.

Methamphetamine's move east has been driven in part, authorities say, by
the availability of recipes on Web sites that describe ways to cook
chemicals to make the drug.

Missouri, because of its central location and rural landscape where labs
can be hidden easily, has become the second front in what officials
describe as an explosion of meth use across America.

In fiscal 2002, local police and U.S. agents shut down 1,039 labs in
Missouri, 321 in Illinois, 89 in Florida and 85 in Georgia. Seven years
earlier, officials had reported finding 29 labs in Missouri and two each in
Illinois, Florida and Georgia.

Meth has left a trail of addiction in many areas and has led some officials
to take action:

Oklahoma City officials have created an "endangered children's" program
that gives medical care and other help to kids who are found living in
homes that have been turned into meth labs by their addicted parents.
Continued exposure to toxic fumes from such labs can cause fatal burns to
the lungs, damage the liver and spleen, and lead to learning disabilities,
health specialists say.

Last year, Oklahoma City officials put 23 children who were found in meth
labs into protective custody at a center for abused children. Twenty-two
tested positive for exposure to toxic chemicals.

In Cookeville, Tenn., about 80 miles east of Nashville, the City Council
last month passed an ordinance that bans drug stores from selling a
customer more than 100 tablets of the decongestant pseudoephedrine, a
common ingredient in meth recipes. The law also requires businesses to keep
non-prescription forms of pseudoephedrine behind the counter or within 6
feet of the cash register, and it requires purchasers to sign a register.

"The methamphetamine problem here is terrible," says Ricky Shelton, a
Cookeville council member who proposed the measure. "There are children in
foster care, people dying, chemicals in the environment."

He said 54 children in a four-county area that includes Cookeville have
been put in foster care during the past two years because their parents
were caught cooking meth in their homes.

Georgia has imposed similar limits on pseudoephedrine purchases. Several
cities across the nation are considering such laws.

Illinois, which borders Missouri but has had fewer problems with
methamphetamine, has begun issuing bulletins to farmers and fertilizer
suppliers urging them to guard anhydrous ammonia. The chemical compound is
used mostly as a fertilizer but also is a key ingredient in meth.

Illegal drug makers in Illinois and elsewhere have stolen anhydrous
ammonia, which is stored as a liquid in pressurized tanks but becomes a
toxic gas when released. Inhaling the ammonia can cause fatal damage to the
lungs, says Bob Aherin, an agricultural safety professor at the University
of Illinois.

"Drug users trying to make meth can be a danger to themselves and others,"
Aherin says. When they break a hose or a valve while trying to siphon the
liquid, he says, anyone downwind can be harmed if the chemical is released.

Two years ago, Indiana's Legislature made it a felony to dump waste from
controlled substances, largely because of concerns about pollution from
these meth labs.

Chemicals from labs have been dumped in streams and in wooded areas, where
the chemicals have seeped into the soil and contaminated water sources.

Meth cooks, trying to avoid cops, often leave behind harmful chemicals or
residue. A meth producer might check into a motel, cook a batch and leave
the next day, the DEA's Salter says. "Then someone (else) checks in, and
the kids crawl on the carpet and get burned from the chemicals."

Easy to get, simple to make

Methamphetamine stimulates the central nervous system. After feeling an
initial rush and a sense of well-being, people on meth may be hyperactive,
lose their appetites and be unable to sleep. The effects can last up to
eight hours.

The drug is simple to make, requiring easy-to-get ingredients and
rudimentary chemistry. When police find a meth lab, they don chemical suits
and gas masks to protect themselves from fumes.

DEA officials estimate that for each pound of meth produced, a lab operator
winds up with 6 pounds of toxic waste, including leftover chemicals such as
anhydrous ammonia and lye, and solid meth residue.

Cleaning up a lab costs an average of $3,280, the DEA says. It usually
involves removing debris, testing soil and neutralizing chemicals. Larger
labs have cost up to $100,000 to shut down. Most of the money goes to local
cleanup companies through federal grants. Cleaning up meth labs cost the
U.S. government about $24 million in 2002, the DEA says.

In fiscal 2002, the DEA reported more than 9,000 lab raids, up from just
more than 800 in 1995.

"Methamphetamine is on a bigger scale than ever before," says Sheriff Lane
Carter of Moore County in central North Carolina, which recently increased
its narcotics unit from two to five people because of the local meth
problem. "It's cheap to make. It doesn't have to be transported across the
(U.S.) border."

Meth began popping up in North Carolina about two years ago, officials
there say. Last year, 34 labs were found in the state.

This year, "we're at a pace that will double" that, says Dave Gaddis, the
DEA's assistant special agent in charge for North Carolina. "It started in
the western part of the state, and it's migrating east."

Some clever, some desperate

This summer, signs of the rising demand for meth have been particularly
evident in Tennessee.

Within 48 hours last month, authorities in rural Anderson County, about 30
miles north of Knoxville, shut down three labs. The third bust was the
county's 22nd of the year. Through June 3, Tennessee officials had shut
down 305 labs. In all of last year, there were 387 lab raids in Tennessee.

The Anderson County busts, in which four people were arrested on drug
charges, reflected the various methods -- some clever, some desperate --
that lab operators use. Many operators, authorities say, are addicts who
make and sell the drug to feed their habits.

One of the cases involved a local retirement home, where two grandchildren
of a resident set up a lab while she was in the hospital. The woman's
neighbors knew about the lab but were too terrified to report it, Chief
Deputy Sheriff Lewis Ridenour says.

In another case, a suspect allegedly ran a lab from his car's trunk.
Deputies closed a road for 17 hours while the chemicals were removed.
Another bust occurred in a duplex near eight other homes.

"It's a huge health hazard," Ridenour says. Labs "can explode. A child, or
anyone, can come in contact with toxic materials."

While law enforcement officers raid labs, anti-drug groups and government
officials taken aback by meth's impact are focusing on prevention. The
Partnership for a Drug-Free America is testing a campaign in Missouri and
Phoenix that warns of the dangers of using meth. In commercials, doctors
describe the risks meth can pose to users and their kids.

Illinois lawmakers passed two anti-meth laws in May. One allows judges to
double the maximum sentence and fine for those convicted of meth crimes
done in the presence of children. The other requires convicted meth makers
and users to pay for cleanups.

Because of Illinois' advisories on ammonia, many fertilizer dealers have
built fences and installed motion detectors around their tanks, Aherin
says. Some have placed locks on the tanks' valves.

Officials in Illinois have asked retailers to put medicines containing
pseudoephedrine behind the counter and to limit the number of packages per
customer. Illinois retailers aren't required to do so, but "we have found a
great willingness from the Wal-Marts and Kmarts and Walgreen's and
7-Elevens" to cooperate, Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan says.
"People are beginning to realize how dangerous meth is."

There has been some opposition to limiting consumers' access to
pseudoephedrine, which is in Sudafed and other popular medicines. In
Tennessee, a plan similar to Cookesville's failed in the Legislature last
month. Retail groups have led the resistance.

"I'm not convinced that limiting consumer access is the best way to combat
the problem," says Nancy Bukar of the Consumer Healthcare Products
Association, which represents makers and suppliers of over-the-counter
medicines.

Purchase limits merely inconvenience legitimate consumers, she says, adding
that those bent on finding meth ingredients go from store to store
collecting packages, a practice authorities call "smurfing."

Meanwhile, officials are seeing more "ice," the potent form of meth that
resembles rock salt. "It's akin to crack," says Mike Furgason, special
agent in charge of the DEA's Atlanta division, which includes Georgia,
Tennessee and the Carolinas. "They are breeding a more addicted customer."