METH MANUFACTURE ON RISE

[Alfa]

METH MANUFACTURE ON RISE


Mass-Produced Drug Coming From Mexico


In the last eight months Blount County has seen an increase in methamphetamine manufacture, a trend that will likely continue.


That's the forecast from speakers at one session of the East Tennessee Society of Professional Journalists workshop, "Drug Addiction and Recovery," held Monday at Cornerstone of Recovery in Louisville.


"It's so difficult to police," said Knox County District Attorney General Randy Nichols. "You can make it in your car."


The drug presents unique problems for law enforcement, according to Capt.


Jimmy Long, assistant chief deputy, Blount County Sheriff's Office.


It's cheap and easy to make. The toxic environment created by meth labs often requires special teams of officers for meth lab seizure. The cost to clean up meth lab sites is an average of $8,000 each, said Long.


Officers require additional training, an ongoing process, according to Long. And inmates who use meth also need additional medical attention.


"The hidden costs of it are something to see," he said.


Long said meth manufacturing has been more common in surrounding counties like Monroe and Anderson, but two recent busts for manufacture of the drug show that it is creeping this way. In both cases, the people arrested in Blount County for making the drug were Monroe County residents.


Mass Produced In Mexico


Nichols said he expects to see more of the drug in both rural and urban areas. Meth, he said, is now being mass-produced in Mexico.


"I think this is going to work both sides of the drug market," said Long.


"The guy that's just afraid to cook it can go buy it."


There is even a market for the sale of meth users' urine in jails and prison, as well as the street, according to Nichols.


"There is a market for the urine now," said Nichols, who asked Long, "How you going to police that, chief? What's next?"


Tennessee accounts for 75 percent of meth lab seizures in the southeast, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.


To raise awareness, the Tennessee District Attorney's Conference recently produced a video called "Meth is Death." Nichols showed participants at the ETSPJ workshop the video, which has interviews with recovering meth addicts, inmates jailed for meth production and accounts from police officers.


"If we can't educate children not to use it, I don't see how we can overcome it," he said.


Gov. Phil Bredesen recently introduced legislation aimed at addressing methamphetamine manufacturing and abuse called the "Meth-Free Tennessee Act of 2005."


Some major provisions of the bill include limitations on the sale of cold and sinus medicines containing the decongestant pseudoephedrine, a vital ingredient used to make meth; closure of the so-called "personal-use loophole" in criminal law, which allows meth cooks to get lighter penalties by claiming they manufactured the drug only for personal use; requirement of health professionals to report meth lab-related burns and injuries to local law enforcement; creation of an online registry within the state Department of Environment and Conservation listing properties quarantined by law enforcement due to meth lab contamination.


War Just Begun


Even with these measures, the war on meth has really just begun, speakers indicated. The state's first meth-related murder was less than a decade ago in Warren County.


"I don't think you've seen anything yet," said Nichols.


Monday's ETSPJ workshop, co-sponsored by The Daily Times and Cornerstone of Recovery, also included sessions on:


* Addiction: the neurobiology, pharmacology, genetics and other approaches to addiction, Cornerstone of Recovery Medical Director Dr. Gary O'Shaughnessy.


* A brief history of Cornerstone of Recovery, Dan Caldwell, Cornerstone of Recovery CEO.


* Blount County Drug Court program, Blount County Circuit Court Judge D.


Kelly Thomas Jr.


* Treatment: model, goals, what's needed and what's necessary, Dr. Scott Anderson, Cornerstone of Recovery Clinical Director.


* A first-person account: addiction and recovery, Steve Wildsmith, Weekend editor of The Daily Times.


* The business of treatment: the cost of treatment vs. jail, insurance problems, Mark Hartley, Cornerstone of Recovery Chief Financial Officer.

[elbow]

Meth is really getting more and more popular all over America-I wonder
if it is just the availability and the fact that it is easy to make
that contributes to this popularity, because if you see how crazy
people can get from a meth addiction, that it is really ugly and
tragic-there is no attraction to this drug for most people who have
seen someone's life get messed up by meth addiction.

[egoDEATH]

Of all the bad things to say about Meth, there's one aspect nobody can deny......It's the best American-made product of the decade. LOL. Edited by: egoDEATH

[Woodman]

If meth is really that bad then it just goes to show you
how fucked-up and completely out-of-wack our
federal government's priorities are in this silly-ass
"War on Drugs."

They're busy trying to chase down people for
smoking medical marijuana, for crying out loud!

[discobloodbath]

curious but whys there a market for meth user urine

[BEEKSc1]

yea i was arizona this summer and while the cab driver was driving my gf and i to meet up with my family, the cab driver informed us how crazy bad the meth problem was out the these small desert towns. families are ruined in these little towns bc of the massive amounts of meth that are made on the outskirts ofthe towns.


ppl make the meth in tralors and move locations every couple of days and the the cops don't really want to engager themselves by going on the outskirts out the towns (in destitute areas, with just cacti and dessert) it's a very bad problem, but that's what happens when all drugs are outlawed and meth is drug that's most widely available out there.