Pubdate: Sun, 04 Dec 2005
Source: Arizona Daily Star (AZ)
Copyright: 2005 Pulitzer Publishing Co.
Contact:  http://www.azstarnet.com/star/today/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/23
Author: Michael Marizco, and Becky Pallack
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topics/mexico

MEXICAN LABS SET TO POUR METH INTO ARIZ

CULIACN, SinaloaI - The meth lab by the seminary was exceptional, even
by narco-trafficker standards.

Equipped with cylinders of acetone, ethanol and oxygen tanks,
principal ingredients of meth production, the superlab was capable of
producing at least 12 pounds of crystal methamphetamine  nearly 18,000
quarter-gram doses  a day, investigators estimate.

Its discovery surprised investigtors in Sinaloa, where a dose of
crystal sells on the streets for 30 pesos, about $2.50.

But across the border, federal and state officials believe a much more
lucrative market has opened its doors: Arizona.

Arizona has long been a distribution point for Mexican meth into the
rest of the country. The state has had a law since Nov. 1 limiting the
purchase of pseudoephedrine to 9 grams and placing medicines
containing pseudoephedrine behind the counter, to crack down on local
labs that use the ingredient to "cook" meth.

But few believe the restrictions will keep the drug out of Arizona,
particularly when meth smuggling is growing along the border.
Officials fear the state may see what happened when Oklahoma passed a
pseudoephedrine crackdown: an increase in Mexican meth.

In Sinaloa, drug cartels have already begun adding meth to their
illicit product line.

A good chunk of that could end up in Tucson, where meth sells for
about $50 a gram, and where local police acknowledge that users will
be looking for new ways to get the drug.

Detectives are anticipating stepped-up investigations of traffickers
who move drugs from Mexico, said Capt. David Neri, who leads the
Counter Narcotics Alliance.

Once meth gets to Tucson, it can be linked to more than half of local
property crimes, including most fraud and identity-theft cases, police
say.

Meth harms local kids, too. Arizona leads the nation in meth use by
children between 12 and 17, according to the Arizona Attorney
General's Office. And last year about 600 children in Pima County were
taken from their homes and put in foster care because of their
parents' meth addictions.

"The legislation isn't going to stop someone who is addicted to an
illegal drug. What we were looking at is something that we have some
control over," said Andrea Esquer, spokeswoman for Arizona's attorney
general.

The United States and Canada began restricting pseudoephedrine
shipments from sources including Hong Kong and the Czech Republic
about five years ago, said Ramona Sanchez, spokeswoman for the U.S.
Drug Enforcement Administration's Phoenix office.

The restrictions have helped slash the number of so-called superlabs,
which can produce 10 pounds of meth in one day. More primitive
mom-and-pop operations churn out, at most, a few ounces. In 2001, 264
superlabs were seized in the United States. By 2004, the number
dropped to 55.

"The large-scale methamphetamine production in the U.S. is declining.
That is why you see a proliferation in Mexico and along our borders,"
Sanchez said.

Oklahoma first to curb sales

In 2002, Oklahoma became the first state to restrict over-the-counter
sales of pseudoephedrine. Twenty-three states have followed.

The result for Oklahoma has been fewer meth labs and dumping sites  20
per month now compared with 120.

But there has been a marked increase in the influx of meth from
Mexico, said Mark Woodward, spokesman for the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics.

That result was not unexpected. Nobody believed the restrictions on
cold medicine would win the war on meth, he said.

"But we do not have to respond to meth labs now. It frees us up to
start working larger drug investigations," he said.

Meanwhile, the demand for the drug elsewhere doesn't seem to have
wavered, and large amounts of meth keep flowing across the border.
Seizures in Texas increased from 14 pounds in 1992 to 3,820 pounds in
2003, the Brownsville Herald reported last summer.

At the Arizona border with Sonora, U.S. Customs and Border Protection
officers seized 1,781 pounds of meth last year. Three years ago they
seized only 320 pounds, said agency spokesman Brian Levin.

On Thanksgiving Day, customs inspectors in Douglas found 14 pounds
stashed in the camper of a pickup truck coming in from Agua Prieta,
Sonora, Levin said.

Anecdotally, U.S. Attorney Anne Mosher, who assigns drug cases in
Tucson, has seen increases in raw poundage carried by individuals
crossing into Arizona.

"The volumes have surprised me," she said.

Mexico began restricting the movement of pseudoephedrine earlier this
year, requiring shipments to move only by armored car equipped with
GPS-tracking devices and escorted by police, according to the
Associated Press.

But pseudoephedrine and other chemicals used to make meth are readily
available in Mexico, said Anthony Coulson, assistant special agent in
charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration's Tucson office.

Phosphorus and acetone are diverted from Asia and Germany to Mexico,
where they ultimately are used by criminal organizations, he said.

And in Sinaloa, home to Mexico's most powerful drug lords, the cartels
have already begun shifting gears to add meth to the traditional
business of supplying marijuana and cocaine, he said.

In Culiacn, that's meant an increase in synthetic drugs like crystal
meth, said Miguel Angel Campos Ortiz, the Sinaloa delegate for the
Mexico Attorney General's Office.

It was his federal investigators who discovered the meth lab by the
seminary in October, he said. It was the fourth well-equipped lab
found this year.

"What we've been seeing is grams, but it's turning into mass
production," he said.

Narcotics garbage dumps

Ismael Bojrquez, publisher of Rio Doce, a weekly newspaper in Culiacn,
sees the evidence of that in the narco-basureros, narcotics garbage
dumps where hundreds of blister packs from cold medicine containing
pseudoephedrine are discarded.

Three weeks ago, a pile of the blister packs appeared on a street
corner. "We weren't seeing these even three years ago," he said.

The existence of established smuggling corridors is a big advantage
for the drug traffickers, and Mexico is poorly prepared for the battle
ahead, said Comandante Apolo, head of the Sinaloa Special Forces Unit,
who identified himself only by his undercover code name due to death
threats from traffickers.

"Mexico's trying, I think, but they're still in their infancy to come
up with a strong enforcement counterattack," said the DEA's Coulson.
"They weren't accustomed to attacking this type of manufacturing."
Inside

Sinaloa's NARCS live with death threats but just laugh them off.
Still, a low profile is the best kind.

Star reporter Becky Pallack contributed to this article.
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MAP posted-by: Larry Seguin