AUTHORITIES CRACK DOWN ON POPULAR DRUG

Methamphetamine, Curry County's most popular street drug, is the driving
force behind most of its crime ­ and its greatest public safety threat, say
two of the county's top cops.

"A high percentage of our arrests for burglary, theft and assault are
meth-related," said Curry County Sheriff Kent Owens.

"You go to a house to serve a drug search warrant, and you solve several
burglaries," added Brookings Police Chief Chris Wallace.

That's a big change in the nature of both local crime and the criminals,
say Owens and Wallace, who spoke Thursday morning in Wallace's office.

"It used to be a lot of users held down jobs," said Owens. "They didn't
have to go out and break into cars to support their habits."

That made it easy to keep track of the few chronic lawbreakers in the area,
said Owens, because they were basically the same handful who didn't work.

"We usually knew who those people were," said Owens. "There wasn't the
violence, the intimidation, the crimes weren't necessarily associated with
drugs."

Unlike the days of flyovers that uncovered marijuana fields, police now
rely heavily on informants, requiring lots of time and manpower to make
sure they are protected.

"Before meth we never had to run undercover or use informants," said Owens.
"Now, you can be working a number of cases, and not clear any of them
because you can't burn your informant."

Since the 1990s, when meth's popularity began catching on, meth-driven
crimes have not only become overwhelmingly common but violent.

Users can't hold down a regular job, so they have to resort to crime to
support their habit, said Wallace.

"When (police) go into their homes, it's much more dangerous, they've
always got weapons," said Wallace. "Every cop they see is out to get them ­
the potential for violence is higher."

Even traffic stops become more dangerous, said Wallace, using an
intoxicated driving arrest made by Officer Donnie Dotson made last year as
an example.

While walking the handcuffed driver back to his patrol car, the man rammed
Dotson right into the path of an oncoming car.

"If it hadn't turned out to be a deputy with defensive driving skills, he'd
have been hit," said Wallace.

The drug causes the kind of dissociation that occurs with sleep deprivation
— paranoia combined with a sense of invulnerability.

"It gives them a sense of power; they stay up for days, said Wallace, "then
crash, then they're up and running again."

Owens says he suspects this has also lead to a lot of unreported sexual
assaults.

"Guys on meth go looking for younger girls who like to party," said Owens.
"Because it gives them access to alcohol, and for fear of reprisal,
assaults don't get reported."

But none of this means the typical meth user is easy to spot, said Wallace.

"The average person won't see them, they can appear to be a normal person,"
said Wallace. "When they become dangerous is when they need money."

Meth users can turn violent quickly, even when they don't plan to.

"They may not intend to kill somebody, they just want money," said Wallace.
"But that's when they can turn violent and deadly."

"Meth is bad stuff," Owens said. "It's like pouring battery acid on your
brain."

Wallace ­ noting his officers are the only ones in Curry County available
24 hours a day, seven days a week ­ says he has made the fight against meth
users a top priority.

"We are going to battle this by dedicating all the resources of this
department," said Wallace. "I've educated my officers from top to bottom ­
zero tolerance is what people are going to s