STATE BRACES FOR POTENTIAL GROWTH IN METH USE

PELHAM -- When Joshua Caprarella began firing his 9 mm handgun at the
floorboards and walls of his apartment, he believed he was shooting
at a man "wearing a ski mask, holding a rifle with a silencer."
Pelham police announced themselves at Caprarella's door, and a bullet
whirred between them in response.

Caprarella pushed an air conditioner through his second-story window,
tossed out his gun, then jumped head first after it, before
surrendering, police said. Later, the 24-year-old told police he had
been using crystal meth for two years, although he hadn't taken the
drug in a week.

Authorities are worried that the Sept. 27 arrest of Caprarella, who
is now undergoing a mental evaluation, could become a case they'll be
seeing regularly if crystal methamphetamine gets a foothold in New
Hampshire's drug culture. "In comparison to other drugs, it's
frightening because it's highly addictive," said police Capt. Joseph
Roark. "There's an old saying in the drug culture: Nobody tries meth once."

"We suspect Mr. Caprarella has some paranoia issues that we think
were enhanced by his meth use," he added. "To be frank, these people
make decisions they normally wouldn't make and they become very
desperate to maintain their habit." State and federal law enforcement
officials have been quietly bracing for the possibility that crystal
meth would become the new drug of choice by gaining the same
popularity that heroin earned here in the late 1990s when purity
levels skyrocketed and the price dropped down to $6 to $8 a dose.
Over the summer, a legislative caucus made up of state and federal
prosecutors, health officials, and state representatives drafted two
bills designed to curb the availability of crystal meth.

One bill would prevent people from buying over-the-counter
medications in bulk that contain ephedrine and pseudoephedrine, which
can work as a key ingredient for "cooking" common household products
into methamphetamine. A second bill proposes enhanced penalties for
those who set up "meth labs" to create the drug, and leave behind
toxic byproducts in the ground and air. Both bills will go before
legislators in January.

Police say the cases they've seen are few and far between, but the
discovery of approximately a dozen small methamphetamine labs in the
last 18 months has state officials talking about how to prevent the
drug from becoming popular. In towns and cities across the Midwest,
officials have had to deal with users who suffer devastating mental
illness as a result of using crystal meth. And they're also being
left to clean up small toxic-waste sites created by homemade labs
that manufacture the drug.

"What we're seeing in New Hampshire is more of the individual
producer of meth who is cooking for themselves and a small amount of
associates," said Senior Assistant Attorney General Jane Young, who
prosecutes drug cases for the state. Attorney General Kelly Ayotte
said her office -- which includes the state's Drug Task Force -- has
been tracking how many meth labs have been found in New Hampshire
since the first one was discovered in 2000 to determine how popular
the drug is becoming.

Ayotte worries that the sustained high crystal meth gives users --
compared to drugs like cocaine and heroin -- could attract addicts
quickly. "The high lasts for 12 to 24 hours and what happens is, it's
the longer high that draws people to it," she said.

Between the prospect of having to deal with costly environmental
cleanups and new problems for treatment, she said, "I do think it's a
statewide problem."

The bulk of the state's meth cases have been in Grafton County, but
Ayotte believes there's nothing to stop the drug from spreading to
the southern part of the state.

Dealing with the aftermath of crystal meth addiction is more
devastating than other hard-core drugs like heroin, said Ray McGarty,
executive director of Southeastern New Hampshire Services in Dover.
McGarty runs a 30-bed detoxification program in Dover that takes in
clients from across New Hampshire and Maine. "The sheer physical
debilitation from meth use happens so rapidly," he said. "Teeth fall
out; abscesses form. It has toxic effects on the brain, and we see
massive problems with people's cognitive abilities, which is needed
for recovery." Brain damage and malnutrition set in because some of
the household ingredients are pure poison: Drain cleaner, fertilizer
and over-the-counter medications are often culled for making meth.
The gap in time since Caprarella allegedly took the drug wouldn't
stop someone like him from hallucinating, McGarty said. "For many
people, there's a certain threshold for developing a mental illness,
and methamphetamine pushes people beyond that," he said. "The
aftereffects can go on for a long, long time."

Local police would have to get used to dealing with users who not
only suffer from wild hallucinations, but act violently when they're
on and off the drug. McGarty, like law enforcement officials, said
he's seen few cases of crystal meth because "it either hasn't hit
yet or we're not fertile ground for it." "I think it's more the case
that we're not fertile ground for it because we still have a very
cheap abundance of heroin," he said. "So long as we continue to be
flooded with cheap heroin, there's not much of a reason to set up
(meth) labs."

Drug users in Southern New Hampshire are buying mainly cocaine,
heroin and marijuana, according to police and treatment workers. But
police who focus on drug cases are beginning to see crystal meth on
the street. "The cases we've seen have all been small amounts," said
Detective Kevin Swift, a member of the Cross Border Initiative Task
Force. "In terms of the cases we've done recently, I don't know that
we've done a strict meth case rather than trip over it while doing
something else."

The small amounts that have been found by CBI -- a task force
designed to stem the flow of drugs as they cross state lines, moving
south to north a€" are coming from out of state, Swift said.

Meth labs are simple to set up, and can be mobile enough to be set up
in hotel rooms or somebody's home. Rockingham County Attorney James
Reams said one of the more unusual cases was found in Portsmouth last
year when a police officer caught a man cooking meth in his car while
parked at a local grocery store. "We're starting to see it," Reams
said. "We've had a few cases around the Exeter-Hampton town line. Our
theory is the price of heroin is so low, it hasn't creeped in much yet."

A bag of heroin can be bought relatively cheaply -- for approximately
the same price as a six-pack of beer, according to police and
treatment workers. Young said even though meth users represent a
small number of people using illegal drugs, its appearance has often
foreshadowed a surge in use in other states, and law enforcement
would prefer staying ahead of the curve. Watching what laws
neighboring states are considering in limiting meth's
over-the-counter ingredients, also known as precursors, has played an
important part of that effort, she said.

"The fear is if you limit the precursor in Maine, where are they
going to come -- New Hampshire?" Young said.