DEA starts anti-meth campaign in Indy

INDIANAPOLIS -- The head of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration used Indianapolis on Thursday as a starting point for a cross-country tour focusing on methamphetamine abuse. Authorities say the city a hub for transporting the illegal drug across the nation.\nWhile meth-making is a booming cottage industry, Indiana State Police reported dismantling 681 meth labs last year. As much as 70 percent of the drug sold in the state is cooked in "super labs," mostly in California, DEA Director Asa Hutchinson said at a statewide meth summit.\nWhether made on the West Coast from ingredients imported from Canada and Mexico or cooked in someone's garage from cold pills and batteries bought at the local drugstore, "I believe in rural America -- it is the number one drug problem," Hutchinson said.\nHutchinson spoke to about 500 police officers, prosecutors, school and health officials from around Indiana. He was beginning a 32-state, three-month tour focusing on the meth problem.\nMethamphetamine, dubbed "speed," "crank," "crystal-meth" and "glass" on the streets, has surpassed cocaine in popularity in rural areas and is gaining use in cities, experts say. The stimulant produces a euphoria similar to cocaine but lasts longer and is more addictive. It can be snorted, smoked or injected.\nCompared with other drugs, meth is easy to make, and the price has come down, from an estimated $1,420 per ounce in 1995 to $1,265 in 1999.\n"You've got the cocaine and the crack -- the rich man's high -- and then you've got the poor man's high, and this seems to be everybody's high," said Demetrias McIntosh, a probation officer from St. Joseph County in northern Indiana.\nShe and others who attended the daylong conference heard presentations on meth's effects, how it is made, the hazards posed by the drug's production and how to treat those addicted to the drug.\nAuthorities believe Indianapolis, where four interstate highways converge, is a transportation hub for distributing the drug, State Police Superintendent Mel Carraway said.\nAs quickly as large-scale meth dealers are prosecuted, smaller, homegrown labs seem to pop up to replace them, said Susan Brooks, the U.S. attorney for southern Indiana. State police project they will dismantle 800 meth labs by the end of the year.\nThe solution, Hutchinson said, is to attack not only the supply, but the demand.\nCourts should offer treatment as an alternative to prison time for nonviolent drug offenders, and businesses' drug-testing policies must also include remedial treatment for employees who test positive, Hutchinson said.