METHAMPHETAMINE POSES AN EPIDEMIC OF DESTRUCTION IN SNOHOMISH COUNTY

It looks benign, like table salt or something you might stir into your coffee.

But methamphetamine - known on the street as crank, crystal, stove top,
yellow bam or redneck cocaine - is destroying lives in Snohomish County.

Rarely seen here until about five years ago, meth is now the most popular
hard drug on the street. It is cheap, relatively simple to manufacture and
as popular with some young people as the latest boy band or video game.

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Click here to visit the home page for this 5-part series, featuring online
resources, interactive graphics and links to past Herald coverage of the
local meth epidemic.

Dying for a drug fix

Nobody knows for sure just how many youths are using the drug, but a
statewide survey three years ago found that roughly one in 10 high school
seniors had tried meth at least once. Over the last three years, the number
of meth-related cases in the county has more than tripled.

"There are kids in every high school in Snohomish County using meth," said
Pat Slack, commander of the Snohomish County Regional Drug Task Force,
which investigates drug crime throughout the county, including school
grounds. "What we don't know is if it is 5 percent or 55 percent."

Sheriff Rick Bart said he hears from people every day, from every corner of
the county, who are struggling to save an addicted child, brother or parent.

"We are wasting kids," he said.

National studies show that 22 percent of all meth users are 18 or younger.
Another 35 percent are 18 to 23. Washington ranks as the third-highest
meth-producing state, and Snohomish County is among the top five counties
in Washington where meth labs have been discovered, according to the state
Department of Ecology, which tracks places where toxic chemical cleanup is
necessary. Meth is unusually addictive, flooding the brain's pleasure
centers with a supercharged jolt of chemicals that cause feelings of
well-being. It is a long- lasting high, but one that comes at a terrible
price. Users need increasing quantities of the drug. They stop eating and
stop sleeping, and become increasingly paranoid, violent and impulsive as
the drug becomes the center of their universe.

Addiction can occur with as little as four to six doses of meth, according
to the Northwest High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, a federally funded
law enforcement partnership that includes Snohomish County.

Look below the surface of many local crimes and you will find meth, said
John Adcock, a deputy prosecutor who has spent the past six years
specializing in cases involving drugs and violence. Unlike cocaine, which
must be imported from South America, meth can be manufactured with readily
available materials, such as over-the-counter cold medicines, batteries and
industrial solvents.

The profits to be made from manufacturing and selling the drug are too
great a lure for many, Adcock said. And many of the "cooks" are users
themselves.

On one level, meth is the bathtub gin, the moonshine of the new century.
But unlike the illegal booze that was once brewed in hidden stills in
places such as Whiskey Ridge in Marysville, meth can kill. Its purity and
chemical composition are unknown until after it is zipping through the
user's brain.

"Why would you put anything in your body that some drug-addled moron cooked
up in his kitchen?" Adcock asked. "This stuff is not approved by the FDA."