METH LAB DISCOVERIES ON RISE IN PORT ST. LUCIE

July Arrest The Third Since December

PORT ST. LUCIE Until December, the city's police had never come
across a methamphetamine lab.

Since then, there have been three, the most recent find being July 5
in a Federal Emergency Management Agency trailer at Endicott Street
and Paar Drive in southwest Port St. Lucie.

Police say there's a reason for the drug's growing use in the area.

"It's so much more addictive than crack," said police Detective Walt
Wyckoff. "It makes crack look like candy."

Methamphetamine, a powerful stimulant that can keep users up for
days, typically is encountered as powder or in a more expensive,
crystal-like form that resembles ice shards. Meth, as users often
call it, can be made in several ways, but tablets containing
pseudoephedrine, such as Sudafed, are a common denominator.

The makeshift labs are tough to locate, more so than marijuana
houses, because manufacturers can take them apart in minutes, pack
the beakers, tubing, burners and other items in a car, and be gone.

Asked whether meth is a problem in Port St. Lucie, Detective Gary
Grenier said, "I think it's going to be if we don't continue to track
down these labs and put them out of business."

Meth "cooking" procedures are somewhat complex, involving dangerous
chemicals and multiple steps, and can have fatal consequences.

"All it takes is a hose to come out of a bottle during a certain
process, and it would wipe out everybody that's in there before they
knew it," Grenier said.

Oscar Negron, a special agent with the U.S. Drug Enforcement
Administration, said Florida meth labs typically are encountered in
the Panhandle and in rural, interior counties, such as Polk,
Hillsborough and Osceola.

The number of labs his agency has been involved with in Florida grew
from about 30 in 2000 to more than 330 last year.

Drug users typically progress to meth rather than start with it,
Wyckoff said, noting one user told investigators he took meth to get
out of bed and shot heroin to go to sleep.

"It would take the edge off enough to where he could actually lay
there and close his eyes," Wyckoff said. "That's how bad he was."

In the July 5 raid, investigators found several pistols and a shotgun
at the home, along with audio and video surveillance equipment, the
latter being common at meth labs, Grenier said.

The home's resident, Melissa Marie Hoffpauir, 25, was indicted on
federal charges last week and could face 40 years in prison and $5
million in fines.

The other two raids happened in December and April, and DEA
investigators were involved with all three.

Meth can be snorted, injected, ingested orally or smoked. The Polk
County Sheriff's Office has battled meth since the early 1980s, Chief
W.J. Martin said.

He said it can cost as much as $20,000 to clean up the chemicals left
behind, far more than a cocaine house where evidence is packaged up
and "you're out of there."

"A meth lab is essentially a toxic waste dump," he said.