Pubdate: Sun, 07 Aug 2005 Source: Post and Courier, The (Charleston, SC) Copyright: 2005 Evening Post Publishing Co. Contact: http://www.charleston.net/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/567 Author: Jonathan Maze CHILDREN OF METH USERS PAY BIG PRICE Child welfare agencies struggle to provide care for young victims Berkeley County sheriff's deputies did not find an active methamphetamine lab when they searched Candace Darnell's mobile home in Summerville last year. Instead, police say they found one dismantled and packed away in boxes throughout the home. Police have charged the the 31-year-old Darnell with cleaning up to prepare for a meeting at the home the next day with welfare workers in hopes of regaining custody of her children. Not surprisingly, "she didn't get her kids back," said Detective Clint Ferrell, operations sergeant for the Berkeley County Sheriff's Department. The manufacture and use of methamphetamine is exploding in South Carolina, and child welfare workers and advocates say they are seeing a big jump in the number of child abuse, neglect and abandonment cases related to the widely used narcotic. Meth, already the No. 1 drug problem in the nation for law enforcement, is quickly overwhelming child welfare agencies. Police say they're finding children in many of the meth labs they bust, and social service workers investigating child-neglect complaints often find parents using or making the drug. "With meth, it just disintegrates the family from within, and it does it quickly," said Donny Brock, who runs outpatient treatment services for Charleston County. "Meth addicts are looking at their employment and family in their rearview mirrors long before they try to get sober." The extent of the problem is difficult to quantify because South Carolina doesn't keep track of the number of children placed in foster care because of meth. Nevertheless, child advocates and social service workers say they are seeing more cases where children are pulled from meth labs or homes where the drug is being abused, particularly in the Upstate.For example, Miracle Hill Children's Home, in the foothills of rural Pickens County, has seen a substantial increase in the number of children from meth-laced backgrounds. Kevin Tate, case manager for the facility, said it has refused many children because the home has been full for most of the past year. Many other shelters and foster homes in the Upstate have been full, too, forcing social service workers to transfer children to homes as far away as Columbia. In Anderson County, more than a third of the children in foster care are placed there because of meth. And that might be a conservative number. "There are a certain number of parents who abandon kids in foster care without having a drug screen," said Richard Hane, director of Anderson County's Department of Social Services. "When we try to give people treatment, folks will disappear." In the Charleston area, meth use is already common in rural parts of Dorchester and Berkeley counties. In Berkeley alone, about 70 meth labs have been found during the past three years. One out of five of those labs are in homes where children live, Ferrell estimated. Some of the women arrested in police raids are pregnant. Ferrell recalled one instance in which a 16-year-old, six months pregnant, was found having done meth all night long. In one Charleston County case, police arrested Robert William Gaynor in June and charged him with, among other things, two counts of child endangerment. Two children were in a shed at Gaynor's home on S.C. Highway 162 while meth was being made in the building, police said. CHAINED TO THE FURNITURE If the experience of other states is any guide, meth use will spread in South Carolina. More states, particularly on the West Coast and Midwest, are reporting huge increases in foster children, due almost entirely to the meth problem. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration says that during the past five years more than 15,000 children were either present or living in a meth lab when it was raided. In a recent survey by the National Association of Counties, 40 percent of child welfare workers report higher numbers of children removed from their homes because of meth. Social service agencies are training their workers to recognize meth addiction in the home. Group homes and other agencies are holding workshops on the drug. And several organizations are pushing the state to develop a set of rules for handling meth orphans. "We've seen just the tip of the iceberg at this point," said Glenn Farrow, director of child protective services at the Greenville County Department of Social Services. "It's obviously a growing problem." Known as ice, crank, speed or crystal, meth can be injected, ingested, snorted or smoked and usually comes in a white powder. It's often called "Hillbilly Heroin" or "Redneck Cocaine" because of its popularity in rural areas. Highly addictive and cheap, meth can be made in a makeshift chemical lab using cold capsules and items such as drain cleaner or fertilizer. Many of these chemicals are unstable, especially when mixed. Fifteen percent of meth labs are discovered after they catch fire or explode. The drug works fast, quickly shifting the brain into overdrive and keeping it there for eight to 12 hours. Once their high is done, users "crash," passing out sometimes for days at a time. Meth has been around for decades, but it quickly gained popularity on the West Coast in the mid-1990s and has moved East since, often overtaking crack as the drug of choice. Its use has been blamed for everything from a rise in syphilis cases in New York City's gay community to thefts of air conditioners in Anderson County. "It makes the crack (cocaine) epidemic look like kids eating candy," said Mike Miller, director of the regional forensics lab for Anderson and Oconee counties, one of the state's leading experts on meth. "The problems this drug has created are unlike anything else." One-third of those who take the drug get addicted their first try, according to officials. Meth quickly takes over users' lives, and their children typically end up ignored. Babies have been found wearing dirty diapers after having been left in their cribs for days. Some children, Miller said, have been found chained to furniture or locked in closets so they don't wander off while their parents are sleeping off their highs. Dr. Olga Rosa, medical director of the South Carolina Children's Advocacy and Medical Response System, recalled a California case a few years ago in which a 15-month-old baby was found covered in soot, a byproduct of the meth manufacturing process. The boy had not seen a doctor since he was born. He was malnourished, his ribs sticking out. "He looked exactly like one of those kids in commercials about Third World countries," Rosa said. DAMAGED JUDGMENT At the Spartanburg Children's Shelter, executive director Sylvia Stahley said children arrive gaunt, traumatized and bearing other obvious signs of neglect. One 8-year-old boy at the Boys Home of the South, a group home in Greenville County, was taken in after he was found prowling neighbors' yards and garbage cans, looking for food. "With meth, you see an almost complete lack of desire (by the parents) to care for this person," said Glynda Caddell, the home's executive director. "Normally, they (the children) don't progress. They're very malnourished. It's not physical abuse, but their bodies take the brunt of it." The oldest child in a household where the adults are meth users typically grows up fast. Lynne Gage, a house parent at one of Miracle Hill's emergency shelters, said children of meth-addicted parents are often those who insist on doing things for themselves. "They take more of the responsibility," she said. Abuse of these children is common. Meth can make its users paranoid and delusional, where even the slightest problem can trigger a beating. Police regularly stumble across meth labs while investigating domestic violence reports. Also, the drug supercharges its user's sex drive. That means that children can become easy targets for predators hanging around the home. The Boys Home of the South at one point took in two brothers, ages 7 and 9, after their mother and her boyfriend were arrested for making and selling meth. The home later found that both had been shown pornography and that one was sexually abused. "With a mom whose maternal instincts are gone and is consumed with the drug, other elements are allowed into the house that are evil," Caddell said. Charleston County's Donny Brock said meth damages the part of the brain associated with judgment. "That can explain why parents are cooking up meth and letting their infant go two or three days without eating," Brock said. Those chemicals can have a more serious effect on a child, causing psychosis or seizures. It also can trigger cardiac arrest and stroke, said Dr. Wallace Davies, medical director for emergency services at Anderson Medical Center. Children who have ingested the drug are easy to spot -- they can't quit screaming, said Dr. Olga Rosa, an official with the South Carolina Children's Hospital Collaborative. "It's very heart-wrenching," Rosa said. "They just cry and cry and cry. There's nothing you can do for these kids unless you give them something like valium to calm them down." Just being around a lab and its fumes can be dangerous. Many of the children who've come from homes with meth labs to the Spartanburg shelter suffer sinus and respiratory trouble, even chronic asthma, said Jessica Hanak-Coulter, a worker at Spartanburg Children's Shelter. Because of the chemical exposure, children living in meth labs must be washed before they leave and can bring nothing with them --no toys or stuffed animals, not even the clothes on their back for fear of contamination. "Being removed from a home is difficult for all children," said Hanak-Coulter. "Then you have the added problem of police officers in space suits, hazmat suits, who are afraid to even touch you. It's really, really scary for them." The Spartanburg center gathers together donated clothes and collects anything that can be used for its children in a large storage area, either hanging on a rack or packed in plastic tubs stacked several feet up from the floor. Nonprofit groups, churches and children's advocates in various counties of the Upstate have started putting together "kits" that can be placed in police squad cars for children found in meth homes. The kits include donated items such as T-shirts, toiletries and underwear. When a child is placed into protective custody, social service workers say they typically try first to find a family member willing to care for the children. But that doesn't always work out. In Berkeley County, police in one case took three siblings to their grandparents, only to find out later that the children were returned to their parents after the adults were released from jail. What's more, the grandparents apparently knew their children were taking meth. Now, children are turned over to social services. "This drug doesn't know boundaries," Miller said. "We've arrested 12-year-olds and 97-year-olds. Black, white, Hispanic. We've found meth labs on abandoned pieces of property that I wouldn't bury a horse on, and we've found meth labs in million-dollar homes. "Everybody and their brothers are using meth." - --- MAP posted-by: Josh