SPOKANE, IDAHO COMBAT BOOM IN METH POPULARITY

SPOKANE - Methamphetamine has become such a huge problem in the Spokane area
and neighboring northern Idaho that public officials describe it like an
outbreak of disease.

"It's a full-blown epidemic," said John Grasso, a Spokane County deputy
prosecutor who handles mostly meth offenses.

"There's so much meth out there," Spokane police Lt. Daryl Toombs said, "the
only thing that limits the number of arrests is manpower."

Problems with the addictive powder first appeared locally in the mid-1990s
and surged in the last half of the decade, The Spokesman-Review newspaper
said yesterday.

In the Spokane area and Idaho's Panhandle, the boom has overwhelmed police,
courts and social-service agencies.

Police in Idaho's five northern counties raided 92 suspected meth labs last
year, state police say. That is more than half the statewide total of 171,
even though the Panhandle has just 14 percent of Idaho's population of 1.2
million.

In Spokane County, there were more meth-related arrests last year than for
cocaine and heroin combined.

Thirty-six methamphetamine-manufacturing sites were found in the county last
year, compared with nine the previous year. In the first four months of this
year, 31 were found.

The drug's spread is attributed partly to the fact that it can be made with
chemicals readily available in stores. A purchase of $80 at a hardware store
can buy ingredients for an ounce of meth worth up to $1,000.