DRUG AGENTS FOCUS ON N.D. METH PROBLEM

Bismarck, N.D. (AP) - North Dakota is spending $700,000 a year in federal
grants to specifically fight methamphetamine use that continues to grow at a
rapid pace.

Drug agents busted 15 methamphetamine labs in North Dakota through the first
four months of this year, the state Attorney General’s office and Bureau of
Criminal Investigation said. The state had about the same number of busts
for all of 1999 and only five in 1998, the agencies say.

Meth arrests increased 300 percent nationwide between 1993 and 1998, to
7,587. North Dakota meth arrests have increased 500 percent during the same
time, from 31 in 1993 to 208 in 1998.

Assistant Burleigh County State’s Attorney Rick Volk said meth’s presence
can be seen in the courtroom.

"Methamphetamine was a word you didn’t hear in court (in 1993)," he said.
"That changed in 1995, when you heard about it more and more. Now, just
about every case has methamphetamine or paraphernalia used with
methamphetamine involved in it."

The state uses the federal grant money to pay for four agents; two chemists
and state lab equipment; a meth prosecutor shared with the feds; and money
to pay informants and buy the drug to get it off the streets. That is in
addition to regional drug task forces staffed by local law officers.

The efforts are not nearly enough, said Jeff White with the Bureau of
Criminal Investigation. The problem is overwhelming law officers and forcing
drug agents to conduct aggressive public education campaigns to discourage
new meth users.

"There’s no way we’re going to arrest our way out of this one," White said.
"There’s too many of them. We’re trying to do education, information,
prevention as well as enforcement."

Meth, which is often snorted, keeps users awake for hours on end and leads
to paranoia as they come down from the high. Most of western North Dakota’s
meth supply originates in California and Mexico, and is redistributed
through sources in Billings, Mont., Rapid City, S.D., and Denver, along
major highways, White said.

U.S. Attorney John Schneider said major crackdowns in California have driven
makers and sellers to the Midwest.

"It’s like squeezing a water balloon: You squeeze it in one spot, it bulges
in another," Schneider said. "North Dakota is one of those other spots. It’s
alarming."