STATE CLAIMS VICTORY AGAINST MARIJUANA GROWERS

More than two decades after state and federal authorities raided Oklahoma
marijuana growers, the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs
Control is claiming victory. "We done good," said Russ Higbie, who directs
the bureau's marijuana eradication program. "We've got it whipped now."

The state, which consistently ranked in the top three for domestic
production during the 1980s and early 1990s, has dropped off the charts,
said Scott Rowland, bureau attorney. Cultivated plant seizures once totaled
about 100,000 a year; the past five years, about 6,000 a year were seized.

During the worst part of the fight, Rowland said, landowners in
southeastern Oklahoma were terrified to venture onto their own acreage,
frightened away because of armed growers and booby traps.

"We tracked Oklahoma marijuana to 21 separate states back then," Rowland
said. "We were like Bolivia; we were a source for very high-quality
marijuana. It's a big success story that we've dropped off like this."

Even so, bureau officials -- past and present -- recognize the drug problem
is far from solved.

Not as much marijuana is grown in Oklahoma, but marijuana importers have
stepped in to fill the void. And bureau statistics show that through the
past 10 years, methamphetamine production increased at virtually the same
rate that marijuana seizures decreased.

"There's some disagreement on the issue," Rowland said. "I personally don't
think the marijuana growers are just cooking meth now instead; they're two
different types of drugs. But others do see a correlation there, and it's
hard to say they're wrong when you look at the numbers."

But numbers only tell part of the story.

In 1989, Gov. Henry Bellmon became personally involved in the drug war.

"I was down in McCurtain County ... and was told that during the fall,
during the marijuana harvesting season, many of the people were afraid to
go out in the fields in these rural areas, because these marijuana growers
were not very friendly," Bellmon told The Oklahoman on Tuesday. "They were
very threatening.

"It occurred to me that we were getting in a hell of a shape when people
were afraid to go out on their own land because of these marijuana growers."

That would not stand.

Over the previous decade, the state bureau of narcotics targeted growers,
at least to a limited extent. Agents Fred Means and Malcolm Atwood, both of
whom later would serve as bureau directors, steered efforts toward
southeast Oklahoma, where conditions were ideal for marijuana cultivation.

The men had good reason to think marijuana -- then often called "Oklahoma's
No. 1 cash crop" -- was being grown there.

"I had a pilot's license," said Stan Stamper, publisher of the Hugo Daily
News, "so I flew the cops around here part of the time, helping them find
marijuana fields. ... They used to grow it down here in acres. I've seen
marijuana fields down here myself that were as much as 10 acres."

In one investigation, Means and Atwood netted about 30 suspects and 1,000
pounds of pot. That was just the start.

In 1982, the same year President Reagan appointed the first drug czar,
Congress loosened the "posse comitatus" restrictions, which prohibited
military assets from being used in civilian matters. The less-restrictive
version opened the door for limited cooperation between the military and
narcotics agents.

"We began then to use military helicopters in interventions," Means said.

But the growers still held the upper hand.

In the mid-1980s, Oklahoma drug agents learned marijuana growers had banded
together to form a cooperative, Higbie said.

"Basically it was a bunch of commercial growers working together to promote
and protect each other in case anything happened," Higbie said. "They had
an alliance. They were well ahead of us."

Ignoring property lines, the growers planted on others' land. In a way,
they proved to be gifted botanists.

Through selective breeding, they developed marijuana so potent it came to
be known as "McCurtain Gold" -- prized for its high percentage of
delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, the psychoactive component of pot. By
1989, the growers were entrenched. That was about to change.

Decisive response Bellmon wasn't happy about conditions in southeast Oklahoma.

"The governor just got really mad about that," said retired National Guard
Maj. Gen. Don Ferrell. "He called me in and said we were going to do
something about it. The guard, public safety, the narcotics department --
we all got together and planned to set up an operation out of the Hugo airport.

"They were assigned to find five or six marijuana areas close to the
airport. Well, they found about 40, first shot. They just found it growing
everywhere."

July 18, 1989, 150 members of the combined agencies launched Operation
Quiet Storm -- a raid on four marijuana fields in Choctaw and McCurtain
counties. About 3,000 plants were destroyed, including some which fell to a
machete-wielding Bellmon.

"That was the first attempt where city, state and federal operatives were
all working together to get the growers," Rowland said.

Successive operations -- among them Red River One, Red River Two and
Operation Four Corners -- dealt heavy blows to marijuana operations.

Simultaneously, drug agents were training with military personnel to learn
map-reading, field-craft and rappelling techniques. As their skills
increased, the missions changed form. Instead of going in on foot, agents
slid into remote marijuana patches on lines attached to helicopters.

The missions weren't without risk.

Pathways were mined with traps, Higbie said. Some -- like boards studded
with nails and hidden beneath a bed of leaves -- aimed to injure. Others,
like shotgun blasts triggered with trip wires, had worse intentions.

Aerial entries offered similar perils. Patches were ringed with camouflaged
barbed wire, and plants were rigged to explode if pulled from the ground.

"I encountered a PVC pipe stuffed with D-cell batteries with a pin holding
the parts apart so it wouldn't arm," Higbie said. "The pin was tied to the
marijuana plant. When the plant was moved, the pin pulled and a quarter
stick of dynamite exploded.

"Instantaneously, the sky turned black. I was there. I thought the
helicopter had blown up."

Worse, locals weren't always welcoming to agents whose presence served to
disrupt the local economy. From the air, signs could be seen spray-painted
on roads or buildings.

"They put the juju on you. ... They would put 'Die Air Pigs' on the road
and have a big slash through it," Atwood said.

After threats to poison food or water, the narcotics bureau stopped eating
or drinking anything they hadn't brought with them. No restaurants could be
trusted; no water source was safe.

The situation was, Higbie said, a siege mentality. The combined anti-drug
forces were fighting constant battles -- and winning.

At a crossroads Through the 1990s, the number of cultivated plant seizures
dropped, except for a one-year blip in 1997 when agents targeted growing
operations near Norman and Oklahoma City.

The same attention was being paid to the problem, Higbie said, but the
plants just weren't there anymore.

The past five years, seized plants have fallen to record lows. In 2003,
agents destroyed 4,312 cultivated plants. So far this year, the total is 5,222.

"I'm inclined to declare victory and go on and do something else," Means
said, "because society is faced with more pressing problems right now. But
I think it's a situation that needs to be monitored and made sure it
doesn't come back."

Stamper agreed.

"I would have to agree that it's dwindled away," the publisher said. "I
think 90 percent of the marijuana growing business down here in the county
is gone."

For now, the narcotics bureau is at a crossroads. The drug problem in
Oklahoma has changed.

Methamphetamine is now the drug of choice, with locals "cooking" their own
drugs and more pouring in from Mexico. Marijuana remains popular, but now
most of the pot in Oklahoma is imported, driving up the cost and thus
making it harder to obtain.

The narcotics bureau receives about $300,000 a year from the federal Drug
Enforcement Agency. That money can be used only for eradication efforts,
and it must be spent by the end of each calendar year.

Higbie said the money is getting harder to spend, which is a very welcome
problem.

"You know what?" Higbie said. "We did it."