EXPERT TELLS HOW TO FOLLOW CLUES TO METH LABS

ASHLAND - Sometimes, even the most innocent items can alert police to the
presence of a methamphetamine laboratory, according to Lt. Col. Danny Fenwick.

Take coffee filters, for example.

Meth producers use them to strain the toxic chemical soup that is used to
make the drug, removing the liquid and leaving only the powder, which can
be smoked, snorted or injected, Fenwick said.

The difference between coffee filters used to make crystal meth and those
used to make coffee is that the former are usually stained with a pinkish
residue, he said.

Fenwick, a drug demand-reduction specialist with the Kentucky National
Guard, gave a presentation titled "Meth 101" Thursday at King's Daughters
Medical Center. The program, geared primarily toward law- enforcement
officers, was sponsored by Pathways Inc.'s ALERT Regional Prevention Center.

Another item used in large quantities by meth producers is lithium
batteries, Fenwick said. What they will do is remove the labels from the
batteries, pop the tops and bottoms from the casings and remove the lithium
strips.

One of the chief ingredients in the drug is pseudophedrine, which is found
in many over-the-counter cold remedies and diet aids.

But perhaps the most dangerous substance used in the making of meth is
anhydrous ammonia, Fenwick said.

Anhydrous ammonia is used by farmers as a fertilizer, Fenwick said.
Anhydrous means that it hasn't been diluted with water.

"It's pure ammonia," he said.

Breathing the fumes from anhydrous ammonia can cause instant chemical
pneumonia, or even death, Fenwick said. Contact with skin causes the flesh
to flash-freeze and blacken.

What meth producers will often do is steal anhydrous ammonia from unguarded
farm tanks, storing it in buckets, LP gas cylinders or whatever else is
handy, Fenwick said.

Another tipoff that there's a meth lab operating in the neighborhood is the
odor, which Fenwick said he had heard compared to the smell of cat urine.

"It's just a real nasty chemical smell," he said. "There's nothing organic
about this stuff. It's all chemical."

The process by which methamphetamine is manufactured is often referred to
as "cooking," but according to Fenwick, that is somewhat misleading because
there's no heat involved. Rather, the drug is produced through a series of
chemical reactions.

Initially, meth-making was a nine-step process, but clandestine chemists
have since refined it to five steps, Fenwick said. And, a batch of the drug
can now be produced in six to eight hours, where it used to take 24 hours
or longer, he said.

Fenwick said a growing trend is the mobile meth lab, where chemicals are
mixed in cars, camping trailers and other conveyances. The reason more
producers are going to that method is to avoid being hit hard by
asset-forfeiture laws.

"If they get caught, all they've lost is a car," he said.

Fenwick cited a recent case in Lexington where a police officer noticed a
vehicle pulling a camping trailer that kept traveling New Circle Road over
and over. When the officer stopped the vehicle, he found a working meth lab
inside the trailer, he said.