FORUM FOCUS IS METH PRODUCTION, CHILDREN

Labs Dangerous Places, DEA Agent Says

When the little boy's parents found him, he was face down in their laundry
room, lying in the toxic chemicals used to make methamphetamines.

'They rolled him over and peeled his face off,' said Tim Binkley of the
U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

Binkley showed a picture of the boy, his face still raw, as part of a
presentation yesterday to make a point about the dangers of methamphetamine
production. The chemicals are dangerous to anyone who comes near them,
especially children.

Binkley and other experts on methamphetamine labs helped educate police and
prosecutors at a statewide summit at Wake Forest University's Benson Center.

N.C. Attorney General Roy Cooper called for the forum to help discuss the
rapid spread of methamphetamine labs in North Carolina, found in houses,
trailers and even car trunks.

The SBI dismantled 34 meth labs in 2001, 98 last year, and 133 so far this
year, including one this week in Watauga County when about 30 guns were
also seized. SBI officials expect to find more than 300 labs in 2004.

Fifty-nine children lived in homes where the SBI found labs this year. In
39 cases, children were in the house when the lab was discovered.

'Children are so often put at risk,' Cooper said. 'They've been found in up
to a third of labs that have been busted here in North Carolina.'

The State Bureau of Investigation will get a $312,000 grant from the U.S.
Department of Justice to help children exposed to meth labs.

The typical meth lab does not consist of beakers and fancy equipment. They
are more likely to be crude collections of mason jars, pipes and soda
bottles filled with chemicals that can be bought at the store. The
popularity of meth labs spread east from the Midwest during the 1990s and
reached North Carolina in the past few years.

Methamphetamine is extremely addictive, and the high lasts longer than
cocaine, officials said. It can be injected, smoked, snorted or eaten.

SBI agents often find chemicals on the floor, where children can easily get
to them, said Special Agent Van Shaw, who oversees the bureau's
clandestine-lab investigations.

More meth labs have been discovered in Watauga County than in any other
North Carolina county. Sixteen children in Watauga have been removed from
homes with meth labs, said Chad Slagle of the county's social-services
department. The department created policies in response to the labs, such
as not allowing children to take any clothes or belongings from the houses
or go back inside because of the dangerous chemicals.

'It's been like no other type of situation DSS has ever had to respond to,'
Slagle said.

In some cases, children watch their parents make the drug.

'We had a child who goes to school and tells his first-grade teacher how to
cook meth, and he didn't miss a step,' Watauga Sheriff Mark Shook said.
Deputies raided the child's parents' mobile home and found a lab.

Winston-Salem police Chief Linda Davis and Forsyth County Sheriff Bill
Schatzman were among law-enforcement officials from Northwest North
Carolina who were at the summit.

The clandestine labs have mainly plagued rural areas of North Carolina.
Only a handful have been discovered in Forsyth County. Officers don't rule
out finding more.

'Is there a possibility? Yes,' Schatzman said. 'Do we look for them?
Absolutely.'

The attorney general's office will use ideas generated at yesterday's
meeting to develop plans for legislative proposals, including a request for
harsher penalties for methamphetamine production.