Meth Dealers Cranking Up Speed Is Replacing Crack As Hard Drug Of Choice In Region

The 20-year-old college student knows the joys of the drug called crank, speed, crystal and ice.

He’s soared with its crackling energy and cruised with a rush that goes on and on.

The Pullman resident has also been plagued by piercing headaches and wrenching stomachaches.

Blood has dripped from his nose and paranoia has infected his mind. Even worse, he’s watched what the drug has done to some of his friends.

He calls them “tweakers” - their minds so full of the drug they’re consumed by a schizophrenic and sometimes violent paranoia.

“One of my friends was crying that she could hear people’s thoughts,” the college freshman says. “She was scratching at her face.”

The drug is methamphetamine. And as police throughout the Northwest know, it is becoming the hard drug of choice.

The number of methamphetamine cases handled by the Kootenai County Drug Task Force increased from 16 in 1993 to 31 in 1994, a more than 90 percent rise. The meth cases handled by the Idaho Bureau of Narcotics jumped by 250 percent from 23 in 1992 to 82 in 1994.

“We’re almost seeing methamphetamine eclipse cocaine as the drug of choice,” said Wayne Longo, special agent-in-charge for the Idaho Bureau of Narcotics.

Idaho is not alone.

The Washington State Patrol and various task forces around the state reported an increase from 77 methamphetamine arrests in 1992 to 295 in 1994.

Oregon law enforcement officers, including all agencies as well as the state police, made 1,767 arrests in 1993 - a 55 percent increase from the 1,142 arrests in 1991.

“We think long term, in the next couple of years, that meth will become as significant as crack cocaine,” said Lt. Steve Braun, commander of the Spokane Police Department’s drug unit.

The reason for the drug’s increasing popularity? Money, say law enforcement officials.

Drug dealers have realized their profit margin is a lot bigger when dealing in methamphetamine than in dealing cocaine.

“Crime is all a business,” said Lt. Dennis Bonneville, commander of the Washington State Patrol’s narcotics division. “It is absolutely, purely for the dollar.”

Methamphetamine is a neural stimulant.

The drug is made by “cooks” in clandestine labs where they mix a number of highly toxic and volatile chemicals.

It can be smoked, snorted or injected and provides a high that can last up to 12 hours.

“You’re just so awake,” said the WSU freshman, who first tried the drug as a junior in high school. “It’s kind of like power. You can do things really quickly.”

Crank arrests have become so common that Idaho State Police Cpl. Douglas Orr now keeps a handful of methamphetamine test kits in his patrol car.

After more than a year without making a meth arrest, he made six in October and November.

“We have experienced it everywhere from 13-year-olds on up to older people,” said Capt. Carl Bergh, head of the Kootenai County Drug Task Force.

The only drug for which the task force makes more arrests is marijuana.

Although crack still outdistances methamphetamine in Spokane, police officials believe it’s only a matter of time before crank catches up.

“We’re really worried about battles over the market,” said Lt. Braun. “If the meth dealers are trying to sell meth and the crack cocaine dealers are trying to sell crack, they don’t go into advertising.”

Police throughout the Northwest say much of the methamphetamine seems to be coming from California.

Although crank has traditionally been the domain of white biker gangs, California officials say Mexican nationals previously involved in cocaine trafficking are now jumping into the game because it’s so profitable.

The cost of producing meth is much cheaper than dealing in cocaine, which must be planted, grown, processed and shipped from Central and South America.

“Cocaine is very labor-intensive,” said Michael Freer of the California Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement. With methamphetamine, “you don’t have as many middlemen with their hands out.”

Many of the chemicals used to make methamphetamine are illegal to possess in the United States, but are available in Mexico.

Freer believes the chemicals are often purchased south of the border and transformed into drugs in California.

That means competitive prices for the consumer on the street. Both meth and cocaine cost about $25 for a quarter gram.

But meth users say the drug tends to offer more for the money.

“The high is a lot longer,” said the Pullman resident, who spent eight days straight over Christmas break snorting crank. “Basically the high is a lot of fun.”

With methamphetamine’s popularity come some particular problems for law enforcement officials.

“There’s a lot of violence involved with meth because of the paranoia,” said Longo. “They see cops behind every rock.”

Weapons and meth seem to go hand in hand.

In October, Orr arrested a man with a vial of methamphetamine, a portable scale and several syringes. Orr also confiscated a knife, a .38-caliber revolver and a gun that had been modified into a fully automatic machine pistol, with a makeshift silencer attached.

ISP arrested the same man again two weeks ago. The officer confiscated meth, along with an SKS assault rifle that time.

The paranoia and violence the drug produces make busting “crankers” not only more dangerous for police officers but more difficult.

It’s not easy to get information from meth users, information that investigators often need to make the big busts.

“People are just not coming forward because of the threats of violence,” Longo said. “They’re more afraid of the people on the street than what the police can do with them.”

The labs themselves pose an extreme hazard not only to police officials but to the environment.

In 1986, a meth lab exploded in Athol, Idaho. And in 1989 two bodies were found at a lab in Hauser Lake. The fumes had asphyxiated the two men.

“It’s poison, it really is,” Longo said.

Specially trained hazardous chemicals teams are used to clean up meth labs after they’ve been busted. It can cost anywhere from $10,000 to $100,000 to do, Longo said.

But the labs are often hard to find.

“You’re looking at something that can be set up and torn down in a matter of hours,” Longo said.

Despite the thrilling rush the WSU student has enjoyed, he insists he will never use meth again. He said he’s tired of watching good friends freak out and even turn violent toward him.

“They just get so paranoid and so wigged out and so strange,” he says. “It’s thrashing people really bad.”

One Graphics: Methamphetamine cases increase