NO ESCAPING THE EFFECTS OF METH

Employees at the Talladega County Sheriff's office keep a daily
notice posted showing the jail's capacity -- 125 -- and the number of
prisoners housed in the jail, and noting the percentage of how much
over capacity the jail has become. Local officials estimate that
90-95 percent of the prisoners are there because of drug-related
offenses. "When crystal meth hits you, you'll be begging to get crack
cocaine back as your No. 1 problem."

Talladega County Chief Deputy Jimmy Kilgore said the first time he
heard of crystal meth was at a southeastern seminar on gang activity
back in the '90s. The presenter, a police sergeant from Los Angeles,
had asked the group if any of them had encountered meth. No one else
at the conference had dealt with it -- yet.

"I didn't understand the impact of what he said at that time, but,
boy, now I do," Kilgore said.

"In law enforcement, it's the worst thing I think we've ever
encountered," Kilgore said. "In my mind what makes crystal meth so
bad is that it impacts on everybody. It's dangerous to the
environment. It's dangerous to the first responders who happen up on
a meth lab. It's dangerous to the people that are themselves
manufacturing. People get addicted to this drug and to finance their
drug habit they break into homes, they steal things.

"Almost everybody, to some degree, is affected by it, because it may
be that they have a loved one or a family member or a friend that's
addicted to it, or they've been a crime victim by someone trying to
finance their drug habit."

Just cleaning up a meth lab after one is discovered costs the public
thousands of dollars. Due to the dangerous chemicals used, only
trained and certified personnel are allowed to perform the cleanup
operation, and most departments have to call on contract specialists
to do the job, at an average cost of $7,000 to $10,000, according to
Talladega County Drug and Violent Crime Task Force Cmdr. Jason Murray.

Crowded Jails

The public is also burdened with the cost of keeping meth users in
jail, whether they are arrested on drug charges or for crimes
associated with financing their habit.

"We've got a dramatically overcrowded county jail," Kilgore said.
"Since crystal meth has emerged on the forefront, we've seen an
increase and a change in the make-up of our jail population. It's
just terrible, it really is.

"Probably of the 270 or so inmates we have in the jail right now,
probably 85-90 per cent of those inmates are there on drug-related offenses.

"If it's not a drug offense such as distribution or possession, it's
a property crime that, you know, they were stealing to help support
their habit."

The jail is designed for 125 inmates.

The inmate population is also more sickly, due largely to the effect
of drug use. Of the Talladega County jail's $1.7 million annual
operating budget, approximately $700,000 went for inmate health care
last year, and that figure keeps climbing.

Dangerous Behavior

By all accounts, meth users become paranoid and prone to violent
behavior. They can also become desperate to continue getting the high
they feel from using the drug. Some stop at nothing to get the money
they need to buy the drug or to get ingredients to cook it themselves.

"This is like an intensified high that they get from crack cocaine.
They're more violent, they're more aggressive. They're more brazen
and more apt to commit crimes. They're confrontational," Kilgore
said. "So when a deputy or someone out on the street confronts these
people that are under that influence, oftentimes they're dangerous.

"It's increased our workload by responding to the calls that go along
with that, not to mention the investigation that goes into the
process if there's a report by a citizen that someone is
manufacturing. There's a lot of man-hours that go into it. Without
the Task Force in this county, I don't know what we'd do."

Kilgore thinks a concerted effort to educate young people about the
dangers might be the best way to combat continued increase in use of
meth, which is, essentially, poison.

"I was talking to some kids one day and told them that if they went
to Wal-Mart and picked up everything that has the skull and
crossbones on it, and threw it in that cart, and went home and ate or
drank that, it's the same thing as using meth.

"You wouldn't do that, so why would you use crystal meth? Why would
you take something so toxic and so dangerous and introduce it into your body?"

Worse Than Crack

Talladega County Assistant District Attorney Barry Matson compares
the meth problem to the explosion in crack cocaine in the last decade.

"We started seeing our first cases of crack cocaine around 1990, and
shortly thereafter, crack exploded. We dealt with that all the way
through the '90s and what it did to the violent crime rate. We had
some terrible homicides associated with crack violence.

"Then we began to hear about methamphetamine -- and it's been around
forever, but this is just a new rush of it."

Like Kilgore, Matson recalled a professional conference in the
mid-90s where prosecutors from other parts of the country were
talking about meth.

"People from places like Kansas, Montana and Wyoming were saying,
'This meth stuff is killing us,' and they had never dealt with crack
to any large extent. They were just devastated by the violence
associated with it," Matson said.

He came back and began working with area law enforcement to try to
help get officers trained to deal with it when it appeared locally.

"It was unknown if it was going to displace crack or what," Matson said.

After the county's first meth case in the late '90s, it also exploded
on the scene.

"It did not displace crack -- crack violence and crack cases
continued," he continued. "but just as crack devastated certain
segments of our society, meth has done the same thing to other
aspects, and it doubled again.

"We had a flood of crime and violence with crack and then, boom, we
had another flood of crime and violence. That's what we've been dealing with.

"Looking into the future, and projecting based on what has happened
in other states, is that meth will displace crack -- which is
frightening because the violence and paranoia associated with
methamphetamine is much worse than with crack.

"Your typical crack violence is someone steals or robs or commits a
crime to get money to buy crack. Your typical meth violence is the
paranoia and the aggressiveness of the drug chemically altering their
brain causes them to be violent and paranoid.

"When crack hit it was devastating. When meth hit, it was equally
devastating but in the long run will be worse."

As a prosecutor, Matson estimates that as much as 90-95 percent of
his case load is drug-related.

"Our case load went through the roof in the '90s with crack cocaine,
and it just keeps getting worse and worse.

"There's some connection to drugs in every case -- you can trace it
back -- check forgeries, burglaries, thefts, car thefts. They're
involved in the drug trade; they're stealing to get money for drugs;
it's revenge because somebody cheated in a drug deal. There are some
that are not, but 90 percent or better are drug related."

Of those cases, Matson's best estimate is 60 to 70 percent are
strictly meth related, and it's getting higher.

There's a pattern, a "downward spiral," that Matson sees all too
often with young people to become addicted to the drug.

"They squander all their own personal resources. Their money is gone,
what they had. Then they sponge and borrow and beg and take from
everybody around them. That dries up. Then they sell what they have
or steal from family until that's no longer available -- because
family quits looking the other way, quits getting them out of trouble.

"Then they've got no more money and they begin stealing from the
community. If that can be stopped early enough by family -- family
says, 'Hey, you took this property from me, I'm calling the police,
I'm putting a stop to it,' and have them hit that wall earlier -- the
guy down the street is not going to want him to go into treatment, he
wants him to go to jail -- but if we can get them into treatment
early enough, then we've got a chance, but it gets very difficult if
it goes too long."

Matson said the figures he has seen indicate that meth is 98 percent
addictive on the first try, and that recovery from addiction is less
than 6 percent when the treatment program lasts less than two years.

Losing Business

To look at the problem a different way, Matson points out that the
number one cause of businesses failing in the nation is worthless checks.

WHO Is Writing Them

"Right now our worthless checks are going through the roof with meth
addicts. They're getting hold of a checkbook with no money and
writing 40, 50 or 60 checks," he said. "We've got 'em up there (in
the District Attorney's Worthless Check Division) owing $20,000 in bad checks.

"If somebody has an addition to crack or meth, particularly meth --
it's so sad, I've seen it so many times -- they don't want their
families, their children, their wife, their mama or daddy. They don't
want God, sex, food, community -- they want the drug.

"It is priority one when that addiction takes hold, and there's
nothing that's going to stand in the way of them getting that drug,
once it gets hold."

Facing The Problem

"It's really not a law enforcement problem, it's a community problem,
and we've got to address it in a lot of different ways.

"It's really affecting all aspects of what we do. We're increasing
our education, these red ribbon weeks and talking to high schools.
That's what they want to know about. They're scared to death of it."

Matson also serves as the administrator of the grant for the
Talladega County Drug and Violent Crime Task Force. It is a joint
effort, with special training and special equipment necessary for
working meth cases.

"That's why the Task Force is so effective. Small departments can't
work meth. If every city had to buy that equipment, it would be
outrageous," he said. "But we've got one place that has the equipment
and the training."

Initially, 75 percent of the Task Force's funding was Federal money,
with the balance provided by local government. The county, Sylacauga
and Talladega have provided officers to work for the Task Force.

The Federal contribution is being cut back to 50 percent, which means
the county and its municipalities are being asked to help cover the
costs of the Task Force. Sylacauga, Talladega, Oak Grove and Munford,
as well as Talladega County, have committed resources for next year's
operation. Several area businesses have also contributed money or
in-kind service support.

A Different Kind Of Addiction

Talladega County Drug and Violent Crime Task Force Commander Jason
Murray has learned how meth users behave, a necessity in
investigating tips about meth labs and in personal safety when
confronting the suspects.

"The addiction to meth is different because it actually changes the
way you think. It is mind altering," he said. "I've seen people with
nice businesses and homes squander it all and be living out of a
suitcase to get that next high. They'll do things they wouldn't
normally do -- steal from parents, sisters, hock everything they own."

That list also includes murder.

"Talladega County has been fortunate," he said. "We've only had a
couple of homicides directly related to meth, but it's going to
happen. People go into these meth-induced rages and commit these crimes."

Murray said people need to understand that with meth, addiction can
start with the very first time someone tries the drug.

"Most people, when they try it that first time, they're hooked," he
said. "You try to maintain that high a little longer. Your perception
is different. It consumes you -- it's all your mind will allow you to
concentrate on. You stay up for days on end wanting to maintain that
highest peak, and that's the most dangerous time -- meth psychosis.
The next stage is to crash."

During the peak the user can experience hallucinations, irritability
and violent outbursts. Murray said that in his experience, nine times
out of 10, every violent crime can be traced back to some kind of drug abuse.

"It's the worst thing that I've ever seen. The people it has
destroyed is really amazing. Every single item it takes to make meth
could kill you. The only thing that wouldn't kill you immediately is
the ephedrine.

"The propensity for violence with someone who is on meth is increased
100-fold," he said. "I've seen little men that it would take five or
six people just to get handcuffs on them.

"They do things they wouldn't normally do. They are not the same
person. Their perception is totally different."

Murray said a person at that peak will perceive things as being
aggressive toward them, whether it is or not, and they hear a
continual buzzing in their ears.

"If we turn on the blue lights for a traffic stop, they may see the
lights but think it's an alien trying to get them.

"We try to slow our speech down and keep them talking. It's when they
shut down, that there is a red flag for us."

While on a meth high, users may stay awake continually for four, five
or six days at a time. Eating is not a priority, so their bodies
become weak, and when they crash it hits them suddenly.

"There was one case in Oxford where a user stopped for a red light
and crashed. He was out," Murray said. "When the police came to check
on him, they found his lab in the back seat where he had been cooking
the stuff."

Made With Poison

Meth ingredients are made with toxic household ingredients and cooked
using toxic gases. The labs are dangerous to the cooks and to anyone
else who gets close to them.

Mobile labs present special dangers to motorists.

Murray said that two men were killed in their pickup near the Georgia
line simply carrying fuel for a lab.

"They had a pressurized container of anhydrous ammonia in their
truck, which is a corrosive substance," he said. It eats through the
copper tubing and valves on the containers.

The valve on their container popped off and filled the cab with
ammonia, which killed them immediately, and their truck ran off the
road. Fortunately their truck went off the right side of the road,
and didn't cross over and hit anyone else."

He said there have been five flash fires in houses in the past year
in Talladega County caused by meth labs, situations which endanger
neighbors and firefighters, in addition to anyone in the home.

Even when no fire occurs, residue remains in the homes which can
cause illness or even death to people who come into contact with it
- -- including people who rent a house or apartment after the meth
maker has moved out.

Murray said that two years ago, 22 meth labs were discovered in the
county. Last year there were 47.

"You're going to see that continue to go up," he predicted. "We get
three or four calls per week concerning meth labs.