Pot times July 16, 2005
Fewer Meth Labs Busted In County
URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v05/n1121/a07.htmlNewshawk: Kirk
Pubdate: Fri, 15 Jul 2005 FEWER METH LABS BUSTED IN COUNTY
Source: Columbian, The (WA)
Copyright: 2005 The Columbian Publishing Co.
Contact:
letters@columbian.com
Website: http://www.columbian.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/92
Author: John Branton
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm
(Methamphetamine)
Each year, police bust fewer methamphetamine labs in Clark County and throughout
Washington, but the illegal stimulant seems to be everywhere.
Blame it on outsourcing: specifically couriers bringing pounds of already-cooked
meth up Interstate 5 from southern locales.
"The local market is so inundated with meth from Mexico and California that
there's less of a need to produce it locally," Cmdr. Keith Kilian of
the Clark-Skamania Drug Task Force said Thursday.
Since 2001, when meth lab raids peaked, the numbers reported to the Washington
Department of Ecology have declined each year, said Mary-Ellen Voss, spokeswoman
for the department's chemical spills program.
Several factors have helped drive down meth lab numbers, officials say:
* Recently passed laws have limited the number of packages of over-the-counter
cold pills containing pseudo-ephedrine, which can be used to make meth, that
retail customers can buy in 24 hours.
Beginning Oct. 1, stores will have to keep some such products behind
counters and cannot sell to anyone younger than 18. And in January, a new
law will take effect requiring stores to record names of customers buying
medications containing pseudoephedrine and similar chemicals.
* Canada has cracked down on some legal exports of large quantities of
pseudo-ephedrine.
* And some think local meth cooks, who typically produce only an ounce or two at
a time, are getting more clever about avoiding detection.
Some cooks have been dumping their incriminating chemical byproducts in rivers,
causing pollution, Voss said.
And others burn them in what look to passers-by like simple backyard trash
burns.
Still, meth remains plentiful, officials say.
Last year, the Clark County prosecutor's office handled 604 cases involving meth,
which amounted to 70 percent of all illegal drug-related cases and nearly 25
percent of all criminal cases, officials said in May.
Also in May, drug detectives in Clark County and Clackamas County, Ore., made
record-setting seizures of meth.
Kilian's detectives found about 3 pounds of meth in a secret compartment of a
Honda SUV belonging to a man they'd arrested earlier.
A federal grand jury in May indicted two Oregon men after police in Clark and
Clackamas counties seized 12 pounds of meth, the largest seizure on record in
this area.
About a third of the meth was found when the men were arrested in the parking
lot of the Target store at 16200 S.E. Mill Plain Blvd.
And also in May, a Clark County sheriff's detective stopped a Chevrolet Lumina
van in Hazel Dell because it had a defective headlight. With the help of a
drug-sniffing dog, officers found 2 pounds of meth in the van.
In December, detectives seized 3 pounds of meth and arrested six alleged Mexican
drug dealers at The
Cascades apartment complex near Ellsworth Elementary School.
[Sidebar]
Reported Meth Labs
Washington Department of Ecology figures in the first six months of:
2005
In Clark County 14
Statewide 511
2004
In Clark County 15
Statewide 721
2003
In Clark County 21
Statewide 821
