Pubdate: Wed, 09 Aug 2000
Source: Topeka Capital-Journal (KS)
Copyright: 2000 The Topeka Capital-Journal
Contact:  616 S.E. Jefferson, Topeka, Kansas 66607
Website: http://cjonline.com/
Author: Jim Mclean

STATE 'THREATENED' BY METH

Congressmen Told More Funds Needed For Drug War.

SALINA -- The testimony heard by a trio of congressmen Tuesday about the
extent of the methamphetamine problem in Kansas wasn't surprising.

But it was shocking.

Individuals talked candidly about the seductive nature of the highly
addictive, easy-to-make and extremely profitable drug, which is readily
available even in the state's smallest communities. And law enforcement
officers pleaded for more money, manpower and laws to help them turn the
tide in a battle they are losing.

"My staff and I don't have the strength to go it alone any longer," said
Pawnee County Sheriff Leon Shearrer. "As a law enforcement agency we are
exhausted. As a community we are threatened."

Shearrer, a 26-year veteran of law enforcement, spoke for many rural leaders
when he said, "As an individual with children and grandchildren, I fear for
their future."

Seated at the same table with the sheriff was Roxann Dupre, a 47-year-old
Salina resident who said she "fell in love" with meth at 17.

"From that point on meth was my best friend," Dupre said. "If that meant
ignoring my family, so be it. If it meant lying to everyone I knew and
everyone around me, so be it. I would do almost anything for meth."

Dupre said she stopped using meth 18 months ago after three failed marriages
and the death of her drug-addicted son in a police chase.

Tuesday's field hearing, organized by Rep. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., was the
sixth meeting across the country by members of the House Subcommittee on
Crime.

Moran, whose 1st District covers nearly two-thirds of the state from the
Colorado border to just west of Topeka, doesn't serve on the subcommittee.

But he has been working with other members of the Kansas congressional
delegation to direct more drug enforcement money to Kansas, which ranked
third among the 50 states in the number of meth labs seized last year.

"I think the clear message that we heard today is that the resources are
inadequate," Moran said at a news conference following the 2 1/2-hour
hearing at the Kansas Highway Patrol Training Academy.

Help may be on the way. The U.S. Senate has passed legislation designed to
help states and local law enforcement agencies combat the meth problem. A
similar bill is expected to be voted on in the House next month.

The House measure, H.R. 2987, would:

* Provide $15 million over four years to help state and local law
enforcement personnel investigate and prosecute meth cases in areas
designated High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas.

* Provide $10 million in grants to fund treatment programs in states that,
like Kansas, have seen rapid increases in methamphetamine use.

* Provide $6.5 million to hire Drug Enforcement Administration agents to
assist state and local law enforcement agencies in the investigation and
processing of meth cases.

* Make it a federal crime to steal anhydrous ammonia -- a common farm
chemical -- or transport it across state lines for the purpose of
manufacturing methamphetamine.

* Urge the attorney general to conduct a study to determine the extent to
which ordinary drugstore packages of pseudoephedrine -- a decongestant -- is
used in the manufacture of methamphetamine.

During a brief question and answer period, Dennis Hawver, an Ozawkie lawyer
and the Libertarian candidate for Congress in the 2nd District, which
includes Topeka, said he favored the legalization of methamphetamine and
other drugs. He said while the federal war on drugs has succeeded in filling
the nation's prisons, it has failed to curb drug use.

"It's like another Vietnam," Hawver said. "We're not winning."

Rep. Asa Hutchinson, R-Ark., who chaired the hearing, responded that drug
use declined in the early 1980s when the nation's anti-drug effort was
better funded and focused.

"I just don't see that our country can go in that direction," Hutchinson
said of legalization.

He noted that both of the former addicts who testified at Tuesday's hearing
said they wouldn't have stopped using meth if they hadn't been arrested.

Rep. William "Bill" Jenkins, R-Tenn., also attended the hearing.
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