Meth is community problem, says action team

Patrick Meacham, who lives in Spokane, told how he became addicted to meth and recovered to a group of about 50 at Ephrata High School Monday night.

by Erik Olson<br>Herald Staff Writer
| April 27, 2004 9:00 PM

Stories of abuse and recovery told at presentation at Ephrata High School

Mike Shay started with the Grant County Sheriff's Office in 1988, but he never saw a meth lab until 1995.

In 2002, Grant County law enforcement busted a record 43 meth labs, and Shay said the entire community must fight the problem.

The Grant County Meth Action Team hosted a community presentation "Meth is in my neighborhood" Monday night at Ephrata High School. Last year, about 200 people showed up at Frontier Middle School in Moses Lake to hear a similar discussion featuring a talk from former addict Patrick Meacham and community leaders.

"There's a real need in this area, believe it or not," Shay, a sergeant, said, adding that Washington state is second in the nation in meth arrests.

Meacham, who grew up in California and now lives in Spokane, said he began his chemical dependency by stealing liquor from his dad's cabinet when he was 12, moved on to marijuana, then finally LSD.

He joined the Army to fight in Vietnam in 1969 and came home two years later addicted to heroine. Meacham started using meth with his wife for most of their marriage, he said.

"We found out for 18 years we were loading buddies," Meacham, who is now 52, said.

Until, that is, she entered into a meth-induced psychosis and decided to go clean. When she returned from the hospital, one of Meacham's friends told him she wasn't going to go home with him because he was still using, he said.

He stayed clean for 10 months before he broke down at a place called Ballard's Best Burger and Ale. Meacham went in for a burger, order a draft beer, then ended up loaded before the night was through.

Afterward, he broke down to a friend and found a formula to stay clean. As of April 2, 2004, Meacham said he has been clean for six years.

"That feels good," he said as the crowd of about 50 began clapping. "But on the other side of the coin, I lived a life of 35 years of total destruction."

To help curb the meth problem in the area, Meacham recommended diligent community watch from neighbors. Addicts will lie and steal as a fix for their habit, and Meacham said locking doors and cars is a good first step.

"If you don't care, nobody does," he said.

Moses Lake Police Detective Brian Jones agreed. A third generation of meth production, called "Nazi dope" is most common in Grant County, which produces some of the most "paranoid users in the world right here," Jones said.

Jones showed slides of busted meth labs, which feature everything from discarded batteries to stolen bottles of anhydrous ammonia. Most of the sites were overrun with garbage because addicts tend to lose focus on everything but their next high, he said.

Jones also showed photos of children found by law enforcement at the scene of meth labs. Officers remove the children, who have often been exposed to the harmful chemicals used to make meth, from these places to a foster home, he said.

Methamphetamines were created by governments for soldiers at war, Jones said, because of the chemical's stimulant effects.

World War II Japanese kamikaze pilots, who terrorized American warships with their suicide missions, mixed meth with their sake, Jones said, while some soldiers in the Gulf War were also given the drug by the government without consideration of its addictive effects.

The presentation finished with a panel discussion from local law enforcement and health care officials.

Cheryl French, who works for Grant Mental Healthcare, said meth affects all ages and is in the schools. She said she has seen users as young as 14 years old, though most are in their 20s and 30s.

Avery Harrison, a dentist who cares for Grant County inmates, said meth users can be identified by the decay along their gum lines that is unusual for their young age.

Linda Anderson, who works for the Grant County Prevention and Recovery Center, said addicts will usually not quit because the law tells them they must. The impetus, she said, must come from somewhere else.

"That person has to hit bottom," she said. "You don't want to see that, but sometimes that's what it takes."