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73–821 2001

S. HRG. 106–1033

EMERGING DRUG THREATS AND PERILS FACING

UTAH’S YOUTH

HEARING

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY

UNITED STATES SENATE

ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

JULY 6 AND 7, 2000

SALT LAKE CITY AND CEDAR CITY, UT

Serial No. J–106–101

Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary

(

(II)

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY

ORRIN G. HATCH, Utah, Chairman

STROM THURMOND, South Carolina

CHARLES E. GRASSLEY, Iowa

ARLEN SPECTER, Pennsylvania

JON KYL, Arizona

MIKE DEWINE, Ohio

JOHN ASHCROFT, Missouri

SPENCER ABRAHAM, Michigan

JEFF SESSIONS, Alabama

BOB SMITH, New Hampshire

PATRICK J. LEAHY, Vermont

EDWARD M. KENNEDY, Massachusetts

JOSEPH R. BIDEN, JR., Delaware

HERBERT KOHL, Wisconsin

DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California

RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin

ROBERT G. TORRICELLI, New Jersey

CHARLES E. SCHUMER, New York

MANUS COONEY, Chief Counsel and Staff Director

BRUCE A. COHEN, Minority Chief Counsel

(III)

C O N T E N T S

THURSDAY, JULY 6, 2000

STATEMENT OF COMMITTEE MEMBER

Page

Hatch, Hon. Orrin G., a U.S. Senator from the State of Utah ............................ 1

WITNESSES

Anonymous Person .................................................................................................. 43

Allred, Steve, Substance Abuse Prevention and Treatment Program Manager,

Utah County Division, Human Service .............................................................. 41

Bigelow, Sherryl, Mother of a Methamphetamine addicted Teenage Daughter 26

Greiner, Jon, Chief, Ogden City Police Department, Weber/Morgan Task

Force ...................................................................................................................... 20

Marshall, Donnie, Administrator, U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration ....... 5

Morgan, Kent, Salt Lake County Assistant District Attorney, Narcotics Unit .. 23

Taylor, Colleen, President, Utah, PTA .................................................................. 40

Warner, Paul, U.S. Attorney for Utah ................................................................... 16

Wasden, Roy, Deputy Chief, Salt Lake City Police Department, Head of

Narcotics/Metro Task Force ................................................................................ 23

Welch, Shari, M.D., Emergency Room Physician, LDS Hospital ......................... 37

FRIDAY, JULY 7, 2000

STATEMENT OF COMMITTEE MEMBER

Hatch, Hon. Orrin G., a U.S. Senator from the State of Utah ............................ 53

WITNESSES

Burns, Scott, Iron County Attorney ....................................................................... 65

Corry, Barbara, PTA Regional Director, Region 16, Cedar City, UT, prepared

statement .............................................................................................................. 84

Green, Joseph R., District Director, U.S. Immigration and Naturalization

Service, Department of Justice, prepared statement ........................................ 56

Davis, Bradley, Convicted Methamphetamine Manufacturer and Dealer .......... 89

Harmon, Sandy, Program Director for Substance Abuse Treatment, Southwest Center ........................................................................................................... 82

Houston, Jana, Family Devastated by Methamphetamine, prepared statement ...................................................................................................................... 85

Milne, Tibby, Utah Council for Crime Prevention, prepared statement ............. 78

Mendrala, Don, Assistant Special Agent in Charge, Drug Enforcement Administration ................................................................................................................. 64

Peck, Russell, Captain, St. George Police Department, prepared statement ..... 67

Warner, Paul, U.S. Attorney for Utah, prepared statement ................................ 58

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EMERGING DRUG THREATS AND PERILS

FACING UTAH’S YOUTH

THURSDAY, JULY 6, 2000

U.S. SENATE, COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY, Salt Lake City, UT.

The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 1:10 p.m., at Highland

High School, 2166 South 1700 East, Salt Lake City, UT, Hon.

Orrin G. Hatch (chairman of the committee) presiding.

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. ORRIN G. HATCH, A U.S.

SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF UTAH

Chairman HATCH. Let’s call this committee hearing to order.

Good afternoon, we welcome you all to this hearing of the Senate

Judiciary Committee. I’m holding these hearings both here and in

Cedar City examining the existing and emerging threats posed by

illicit drugs to Utah’s young people.

I’m glad to see so many people here who are as committed, as

I am, to focussing attention, educational, and law enforcement resources on combating this problem.

Let me just recognize some of the very important people we have

in attendance today. Joe Green, if you could stand so everybody

knows who you are. Joe is doing a great job, we appreciate having

you here.

Steve Branch, officer in charge of the Salt Lake City Education

Service, also doing a great job for us.

Greg Deardon, who I have a great deal of admiration for. Greg

is over here, the commissioner for the Department of Public Safety

for the State of Utah, he’s doing a great job.

Camille Anthony. Where’s Camille? Back in the back. Camille is

the executive commissioner of Criminal Juvenile Justice.

Randal Anderson, U.S. Marshal. Where’s Randy? There he is.

We’re honored to have you here. He’s doing a terrific job as U.S.

Marshal, one of the best employments we’ve ever made, I think.

Margaret Nadol. Margaret, you bet. Margaret is the Young Women’s General President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day

Saints, and she has a tremendous influence over our youth all over

the country, especially here in Utah.

Mayor Janice Auger, the mayor of Taylorsville, doing some very

interesting work in this area. And we’re grateful to have all of you

here today.

Now, the goal of today’s hearing is to begin a public dialogue on

how we can work together to combat the too-little-known dangers

of a growing substance abuse problem in our country, but most of

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all in our community. A lot of Utahns don’t realize how significant

and serious this is.

Most Utahns have never heard of methamphetamine. We know

meth is a horrible drug and the labs where it’s manufactured are

producing tremendously toxic chemicals that pose risks to whole

neighborhoods. Meth’s association with criminal gangs is also very

well known. The cycle of drug abuse and gang violence is readily

apparent to our fellow Utahns, and to deal with our gang problem

we also have to deal with a drug problem.

Fewer, however, are aware meth is just one of the so-called, ‘‘club

drugs,’’ that are beginning to attract a whole new group of young

people in Utah. The drugs known as ‘‘club drugs’’ include methamphetamine, Ecstasy, GHB and Rohypnol, and are often used at

parties or night clubs.

The symptoms of club drug use are showing up everywhere.

Utah’s emergency rooms, police departments, schools, and rape crisis centers have experienced increases in reported cases, and tragic

consequences, of this drug use or should we say abuse.

The Utah Rape Recovery Center, for example, received reports of

40 rapes so far this year that are suspected to have involved the

club drug called GHB. That figure represents 35 percent of rapes

reported to the center this year. Meanwhile, last year, 7.3 percent

of Utah high school students reported having used methamphetamine at least once, and according to the Drug Enforcement Agency (the DEA), law enforcement authorities seized 266 methamphetamine labs in Utah in 1999.

A special danger inherent in these drugs is the fact that many

users of club drugs would not consider taking cocaine, LSD, heroin,

or marijuana, drugs that are perceived to be more dangerous. But

because of misinformation about the risks, these young people

knowingly ingest such substances as GHB, so-called ‘‘date rape’’ drug, and are experiencing the problems associated with illicit drug

abuse, including overdose, addiction, amnesia, sexual assault, and

permanent brain damage. The lack of public awareness about club

drugs is luring a whole new population of Utah’s young people into

the horrible consequences of illicit drug use.

Methamphetamine is a powerfully addictive stimulant that produces increased wakefulness, increased physical activity, decreased

appetite, increased respiration, hyperthermia, and euphoria. It can

cause convulsions and can result in death.

Ecstasy is a synthetic, mind-altering drug with amphetaminelike and hallucinogenic properties. Ecstasy has no accepted medical

use and it causes health problems similar to those caused by the

use of amphetamines and cocaine. Psychological difficulties include

confusion, depression, sleep problems, drug craving, severe anxiety,

and paranoia, effects which have continued weeks later. Ecstasy

users have died from acute dehydration.

GHB and Rohypnol are predominantly central nervous system

depressants. Because they are often colorless, tasteless, and odorless, they can be easily added to beverages and ingested unknowingly, causing sedation, often rendering the victim—usually a

young woman—helpless. They have become notorious for their use

in crimes, particularly rape, because these drugs produce amnesia,

making it very difficult to arrest and convict the perpetrator.

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The novelty of these drugs is undoubtedly one reason for the recent surge in their use. Because these drugs are relatively new,

young people may not perceive that taking them is unsafe; rather,

they believe that their reported adverse effects are rare or exaggerated, and that such reactions could never affect them personally.

As is so often the case, when a newer drug arrives on the scene,

young people hear much more about its so-called benefits than

about its potential harms. Young people are attracted to the seemingly increased stamina and intoxicating highs these drugs purport

to offer to them. As Utahns, we all need to understand that using

these drugs can have serious, and potentially deadly, consequences,

and we need to constantly work on this problem.

Over the last several years we have worked hard to obtain more

resources for the local law enforcement. The formation of the Rocky

Mountain High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, for example, has

brought additional DEA resources to Utah to stop trafficking and

close down labs. Just this week a new DEA office in Utah was

opened.

Additionally, Congress enacted the Methamphetamine Control

Act, which I sponsored, to toughen meth penalties and place greater restrictions on the chemicals from which meth is made. This important law has allowed the DEA and other law enforcement entities to stop large quantities of precursor chemicals from being purchased in the United States for the use in manufacturing methamphetamine in Utah and elsewhere.

In our further effort to combat meth, we have also passed the

Methamphetamine Trafficking Penalty Enhancement Act and my

bill, the Methamphetamine Anti-Proliferation Act of 1999. The latter bill, which passed the Senate unanimously last November, in

addition to helping local law enforcement, contains several significant prevention and treatment provisions. We cannot simply punish our way out of this problem.

Finally, we’ve enacted the Hillory J. Fairias and Samantha Reid

Date-Rate Drug Prohibition Act of 2000. This, of course, names two

victims of date rape, officially recognizes the harm caused by GHB

and designates it specifically as a controlled substance.

We’ve also worked to bring more Federal prosecutors and INS officers to Utah to facilitate action against those who are corrupting

and endangering our youth.

It is important that we all work together to respond to this new

peril confronting our young people. The Federal Government can

support State and local efforts. But it cannot be a substitute for

those loving and dedicated parents, teachers, coaches, physicians,

counselors, religious leaders, and police officers who serve daily on

the front lines in the war against the life-threatening and life-ruining dangers facing our children and grandchildren.

We need to educate ourselves about these dangers; gangs, teen

pregnancy, teen suicide, drugs, and now, club drugs, so that we can

better teach and guide our kids.

I personally appreciate the local newspapers writing about these

areas just this week. We love our children, and that’s why we

should do this. And as your Senator and Chairman of the Senate

Judiciary Committee, I want to hear first-hand from Utahns who

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have observed the impact of these drugs in our State. That is why

I have scheduled these hearings in Utah.

We have two panels of distinguished witnesses to testify about

the work they are doing to reduce the threat posed by these drugs

to our young people, and I want to welcome our witnesses and extend my appreciation to them for being here with us today, and I

look forward to their testimony.

Now, let me just introduce our first panel of witnesses. This

panel will discuss what is being done to address the drug problem

and possible solutions to combat this problem. We are very pleased

to have our first panel of witnesses.

Donnie Marshall, the Administrator of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. Mr. Marshall began his law enforcement career in 1969 as a special agent with the Bureau of Narcotics and

Dangerous Drugs, the predecessor agency of the DEA. After a distinguished career with the agency Mr. Marshall was confirmed as

the administrator just this year, making him the first DEA agent

to climb through the ranks and become head of the administration.

We are very fortunate to have him running the DEA. I appreciate

his coming here today, I have great confidence in him and have a

great deal of respect for him. Mr. Marshall, we’re really happy to

have you here in our home State.

We would also like to welcome Paul Warner, the U.S. Attorney

for Utah, doing a terrific job. Mr. Warner’s aggressive efforts on

prosecuting drug cases, gang crime and criminal re-entry cases are

a significant cause of the recent decrease in crime rates in our

State, and we’re glad to have you here, Mr. Warner.

Next we’ll hear from Chief Jon Greiner, with the Ogden City Police Department on the Weber/Morgan Task Force. Chief Greiner

has been effective in leading Ogden City Police in its fight against

drugs, also in facilitating interagency cooperation in Northern

Utah. Appreciate you, appreciate having you here, chief.

Also here is Roy Wasden, the Deputy Chief of the Salt Lake City

Police Department, Head of Narcotics/Metro Task Force. Happy to

have you with us.

Finally we are pleased to have Kent Morgan, who’s the Salt Lake

County Assistant District Attorney in charge of the narcotics unit.

Mr. Morgan has experience with the prosecutor and handled a

number of high profile cases in the District Attorney’s Office.

We have tremendous respect for you three gentleman and the

work that you’re doing. So we want to welcome you here, good

afternoon to each of you, welcome to the hearing on Emerging Drug

Threats and Perils Facing Utah’s Youth.

Mr. Marshall, we’ll start with you.

5

PANEL CONSISTING OF DONNIE MARSHALL, ADMINISTRATOR,

U.S. DRUG ENFORCEMENT ADMINISTRATION; PAUL WARNER, U.S. ATTORNEY FOR UTAH; CHIEF JON GREINER,

OGDEN CITY POLICE DEPARTMENT, WEBER/MORGAN TASK

FORCE; ROY WASDEN, DEPUTY CHIEF, SALT LAKE CITY POLICE DEPARTMENT, HEAD OF NARCOTICS/METRO TASK

FORCE; AND KENT MORGAN, SALT LAKE COUNTY ASSISTANT

DISTRICT ATTORNEY, NARCOTICS UNIT

STATEMENT OF DONNIE MARSHALL

Mr. MARSHALL. Thank you, Senator Hatch, and I appreciate the

opportunity to be here today. It really is a privilege to be here to

discuss what I think is the most serious social threat we’ve had in

our country, now the drug threat in the Nation, particularly the

drug threat in Utah.

Before I start I want to thank you, Senator Hatch, for your support to drug law enforcement and to DEA. I want to thank you for

your leadership on the methamphetamine issues and now on the

club drugs and MDMA and Ecstasy issues. These are really troublesome issues, I think for the country and for Utah, and I’m going

to discuss each of these as we go.

The methamphetamine problem, first of all, is not a new problem

in this country. The methamphetamine problem was a problem

when I began the job about 30 years ago, and back then, however,

it was a little bit different.

Back during even the height of the drug culture in the late 1960s

and early 1970s, your drug culture, for the most part, stayed away

from methamphetamine because they had a saying back then that

speed kills, and that culture stayed more with marijuana, cocaine

and even LSD.

It’s ironic that even back then the drug culture recognized that

methamphetamine was more dangerous than even those drugs. But

more recently methamphetamine began expanding again in our

country, about 6 to 7 years ago, it caught on in a big way in California in the west and spread rapidly through the Midwest, southwest and on to the southeast.

Now, you in the Judiciary Committee and the Congress of the

United States have helped us respond to this growing methamphetamine problem with legislation to combat methamphetamine, to

combat the precursor chemicals, and to provide additional training

and that sort of stuff.

Now, those efforts, I think, have paid off in some ways. We have

a long, long way to go and the use of and trafficking of methamphetamine are still expanding in this country, but there are a

few isolated signs of progress, particularly against the super labs,

the large labs that are operated by the Mexican based drug traffickers.

What you see on this chart here is that we are experiencing, particularly coming out of those Mexican super labs, lower methamphetamine purities in this country. For instance, in 1994 we

saw purities of about 71.9 percent, and in 1999 we’re seeing purities down in the 31.1 percent range.

Another encouraging sign, we’ve seen a shift by the Mexican laboratory in particular from methamphetamine to amphetamine, and

6

we’ve also seen the decline in the hospital emergency room statistics in 1998 and we hope that that will hold.

Now, I believe that these positive signs are a result of a number

of things. A result of the legislation that we’ve gotten in the last

few years, they’re a result of aggressive law enforcement, including

law enforcement cooperation both here in Utah and nationwide,

and particularly I think that they’re the result of our ability to

have impact on the availability of chemicals that are available to

these labs.

Chairman HATCH. Tell the folks what ‘‘purity’’ means.

Mr. MARSHALL. Purity means simply the strength of the powder.

If you have a gram of powder, for instance, if it’s 71 percent pure,

that means that 31 or 29 percent of it is some other product, such

as sugar or starch or that sort of stuff. Generally the less pure a

drug is—the less pure a drug of any kind is—the less dangerous

it is, and that holds true for cocaine, heroin and certainly methamphetamine.

Chairman HATCH. What else does it mean, the lower the purity

that means we’re——

Mr. MARSHALL. The lower the purity, that basically means that

the traffickers have difficulty in producing a high purity drug, and

I think that’s what we’re seeing here.

Chairman HATCH. So purity means we’re really in the—the low

purity means we’re making head way?

Mr. MARSHALL. Exactly.

Chairman HATCH. That’s what I wanted to focus on.

Mr. MARSHALL. Now, I talked about the progress in the Mexican

area, and that’s good news. But unfortunately, I think the progress

in that area has lead to more laboratories that are operated by

what we call the ‘‘mom and pop operations,’’ and these are less sophisticated laboratories, they’re smaller laboratories, and they’re

generally laboratories that are operated by methamphetamine

users. And they will typically produce 1 or 2 ounces of methamphetamine, enough to satisfy their own habit, and sell enough

to get money to then do their next batch of methamphetamine.

Now, the decline in the Mexican laboratories has resulted in an

increase in the mom and pop laboratories, and unfortunately what

that means is that there are more laboratories out there, and that

means also that there’s a greater risk to the public safety and

there’s a greater risk to officer safety as a result of the greater

number of laboratories.

What it also means is that the operators of these laboratories are

harder to attack because, unlike the Mexican organization, there’s

really not a large criminal organization associated with these labs.

They’re usually independent operators, which makes it harder for

law enforcement to find them and attack them.

So the bottom line is that we have a lot more work to do in the

area of methamphetamine. I’m hopeful that the Methamphetamine

Anti-Proliferation Act of 1999 will be passed very soon and that

will give us additional funding for law enforcement investigation;

it will help lab clean up, help the law enforcement training prevention program, and perhaps most importantly it would ban the exchange of methamphetamine recipes on the internet.

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Now, turning to the other problem that we’re looking at this

afternoon; Ecstasy and the ‘‘club drugs,’’ and there are many of

them. GHB, Ketamine, MDMA. To me these drugs are more frightening even than methamphetamine because they are literally a

wolf in sheep’s clothing.

What we see in the world today, in the U.S. today, is that there

is a perception, a decreased perception of the risk of using these

drugs on the part of our young people in this country. There’s a

portrayal of these drugs, particularly Ecstasy, as a ‘‘feel good drug,’’ as a ‘‘hug drug,’’ a portrayal as really a harmless drug.

I recently, for instance, saw an article in Time Magazine, it was

actually a cover story on the drug Ecstasy, and in some places it

was a reasonably balanced portrayal of Ecstasy. But there was one

quote in a Time Magazine article, this is the mainstream press of

the country, there was one quote that just jumped off the page at

me. The quote was as follows, that Ecstasy, ‘‘Appears to have few

negative consequences.’’ Nothing could be further from the truth. There’s a movie out— actually a number of movies—but there’s a particular movie by the

name of Groove that has not yet been released but has been received for reviews of this movie, and generally the reviews say that

the movie is not really about drugs, it’s not really about Ecstasy,

it’s about the culture of music and the culture of clubs and the culture of raves. But in these reviews, when you look down at the very

end kind of in the fine print, the one that I have here with me

today says that the Groove movie is rated R because, ‘‘It includes

party language and many, many drug references.’’ And yet the

movie is being reviewed and sold as a kind of a harmless fun-type

of movie.

Now, I’d also like, if I could, to show you a short video clip. It’s

about 3 or 4 minutes long and it shows the nature of the recent

news coverage that we’ve had in this country over the last several

months, and in this clip—do we have time do that, sir?

Chairman HATCH. Yes.

Mr. MARSHALL. In this clip you will see how the rave club scene

and the party scene, and even the Ecstasy scene, you’ll see how

they can be perceived by young people as harmless or even luring.

But you’re also going to see in this clip some very alarming scenes

about the dangers and the dark side of Ecstasy.

If we could run that video, please.

[Videotape shown.]

Mr. MARSHALL. That, to me, is a very sobering clip about the realities of Ecstasy. I want to point out that the heart of the marketing strategies of these Ecstasy traffickers is in fact the portrayal

of this drug as a harmless drug.

I have with me some samples of Ecstasy, and you can see here—

I’ll pass them up to you in a moment—but these pills are packaged

in a way that they will be attractive to young people. They have

logos such as Warner Brothers, Calvin Klein, Tweety Bird, Tony

the Tiger, and ironically, they even have one with the DEA logo on

them. They are clearly designed to attract young people.

Now, as a part of the marketing of Ecstasy, the organizers of

these rave parties and that sort of stuff, they package it in such

a way that it might be attractive, not only to the young people but

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to parents as well. And the reason it might be attractive to parents

is because there is open advertising of these raves as a music

event, and anything that is openly advertised and not clandestine

would give the appearance of something not too risky. They advertise no alcohol at these events, which there is not.

They all too frequently hold these events in a respectable venue.

I’ve seen one case where a rave was held at a city convention center. They often advertise that there’s security at these events,

which there often is, in the form of off-duty police officers who

themselves are ill informed about what’s really going on there.

So parents might think that these things are a safe place to send

even their younger kids, but I’m telling you nothing could be further from the truth, because Ecstasy itself, as we’ve seen in these

clips, is a frighteningly dangerous drug, when you combine it with

other of the date-rape drugs that you referred to, Senator, and

when you combine it with the sexual predators that hang out

around these rave clubs, it is an absolutely horrifying drug.

In fact, I just saw a story right here in Salt Lake from Friday,

June 30, about a young lady who almost died after she was unknowingly drugged with GHB at a club here in Salt Lake City, and

that’s an example—one more example of the frightening nature of

this drug.

Now, I want to close out—I’m almost done with my time—DEA

is taking a leadership role in trying to combat Ecstasy. We recently

concluded a nationwide investigation called ‘‘Operation Rave,’’ and

you can see here what we learned, a little bit about the Ecstasy

traffic from ‘‘Operation Rave.’’

We learned that it is produced primarily in Europe and Belgium

and the Netherlands; that it is brought into the country primarily

by European, Israeli and Russian organized crime. We have

learned that it costs about 50 cents to a dollar, some cases $2 to

produce a tablet. And then it sells retail in this country for $25 to

$40 per tablet. So you can see the profits would be enormous.

Now, in this particular investigation, which was nationwide, we

seized about 620,000 tablets of Ecstasy and about $1 million in illegal proceeds from the Ecstasy trafficking organization. We’re also,

in July, planning to hold a national conference on the subject of

club drugs, and we’re going to invite a number of law enforcement

people from around the country to this conference.

Our purpose is to raise law enforcement awareness of club drugs

and to devise, I think, more effective and more cohesive national

strategies to combat these club drugs. So we are beginning to take

action on this, and I feel like with the help of the Judiciary and

you, Senator Hatch, and others, that hopefully we will be able to

make some progress on the club drugs as we have hopefully done

with methamphetamine.

Again, I want to thank you for your support and I’d be happy to

answer any questions at the appropriate time.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Marshall follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF DONNIE R. MARSHALL

Senator Hatch, distinguished members of the Committee: I am pleased to have

the opportunity to appear before you today to discuss the emerging drug threats facing the youth of America today. I would first like to thank you personally and the

9

Committee for it’s continued support of the Drug Enforcement Administration

(DEA) and overall support of drug law enforcement.

As you are well aware, the alarming spread of illegal drug abuse by our youth

is having a profound effect in communities throughout the United States. It is fair

to say that the increasing use of synthetic or club drugs such as 3,4

Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA aka Ecstasy). GHB, Ketamine, LSD and

methamphetamine by young adults is quickly becoming one of the most significant

law enforcement and social issues facing our nation today. DEA reporting indicates

widespread abuse within virtually every major city throughout the United States

with indications of trafficking and abuse expanding to smaller cities across the nation. Perhaps most frightening is the decreased perception of risk that young teens

have regarding the use of these drugs. Many mistakenly believe they are not as

harmful or addictive as mainstream drugs.

Of particular concern is the recent explosion of Ecstasy seizures and nationwide

hospital emergency room mentions related to Ecstasy. Although available since the

1980’s, its use has escalated in the 1990’s among college students and young adults,

particularly those who participate in all-night dance parties called ‘‘raves.’’ Recent

statistics indicate that between 1998 and 1999, past year use of ecstasy rose by a

third among 10th graders, and by 56 percent among 12th graders. The greatest

number of MDMA users fell into the 18–25 year old category with slightly greater

than 1.4 million people reporting its use.

While methamphetamine is not an entirely new problem in the United States,

about six years ago an upsurge in methamphetamine trafficking and abuse began

taking hold in many regions of the nation, starting on the West Coast, and rapidly

expanding into the Midwest and Southwestern United States. DEA statistics indicate that in 1993, DEA seized a total of 218 methamphetamine labs nationwide.

Current DEA statistics indicate that in 1999, DEA alone seized 2,021 clandestine

laboratories and that the total number of laboratories seized by Federal, state and

local law enforcement officers nationwide was 7,060 (note: 97% of all reported lab

seizures were either methamphetamine or amphetamine labs). In Utah alone, DEA

participated in the seizure of 208 clandestine laboratories in CY–1999. As such, due

to the potential health and safety threat each pose to the general public, and in particular, America’s youth population, I will focus my testimony today on methamphetamine and MDMA trafficking.

PART I

Methamphetamine nationwide

Traditionally considered the ‘‘poor-man’s’’ cocaine, methamphetamine is a central

nervous system stimulant. Police reporting clearly indicates that methamphetamine

addiction and trafficking has resulted in increased violence and severely impacted

the quality of life in many American communities. Increasing methamphetamine

production and abuse poses a unique challenge for drug enforcement in the United

States. Law enforcement agencies must now face the burdens of additional specialized training for officers, hazardous waste disposal, environmental contamination,

and additional public safety issues of fires, explosions, and poison gas, in addition

to the crime, violence, and abuse problems typically associated with controlled substances.

Until 1998, methamphetamine abuse in the United States was growing at a faster

rate than any other illegal drug. Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN) statistics

show more than a three fold increase in nationwide estimated emergency room admissions for methamphetamine from 1991 to 1997. We are cautiously optimistic that

precursor chemical controls and aggressive local law enforcement measures were the

primary factors in reversing this trend and were the impetus for the dramatic drops

in emergency room admissions which were noted in both 1996 and 1998.

There are at least three distinct components to combating the overall methamphetamine problem: comprehensive domestic and international precursor chemical control and enforcement, fighting organized, high volume drug traffickers and

the identification and clean up of the growing number of smaller producing, ‘‘mom

and pop’’ laboratories. Over the past several years, established Mexican drug trafficking organizations operating in Mexico and Southern and Central California have

seized control of the illicit methamphetamine trade. Mexican drug trafficking organizations have the ability to exploit an existing, well established transportation and

distribution network, on both sides of the border, and to illegally secure large

amounts of precursor chemicals. Mexico based, poly-drug trafficking organizations

have revolutionized the production of methamphetamine by operating large-scale

laboratories in Mexico and California that are capable of producing unprecedented

quantities of methamphetamine.

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Almost all of the ‘‘super labs’’ operating in the United States are located in California. Although Mexican organizations operate only a small percentage of the total

methamphetamine laboratories seized nationally, these super labs produce an estimated 85% of the methamphetamine distributed in the United States. These criminal organizations have saturated the western United States market with methamphetamine, established their distribution cells in other regions of the United

States, and are increasingly moving their methamphetamine to markets in the Midwestern and eastern United States.

Another reason for the methamphetamine lab epidemic is the evolution of technology and the increased use of the Internet. With modern computer technology,

and chemists willing to share their recipes, production information is now available

to anyone with computer access. Aside from marijuana, methamphetamine is the

only illegal drug abused by a noteworthy percentage of the population that an addict

can produce themselves. A cocaine or heroin addict cannot make his own cocaine

or heroin, but a methamphetamine addict only has to turn on their computer to find

a recipe that details the chemicals and process needed. Many addicts have elected

to produce the stimulant themselves.

The growing popularity of methamphetamine has led to an alarmingly high number of clandestine laboratory seizures across the country. The number of clandestine

labs (all types of illegal drugs) seized nationwide by DEA has increased from 306

lab seizures in Calendar Year 1994 to 2,047 in 1999, a 569% increase. The statistics

for 1999 also indicate that 97% of the clandestine laboratory seizures reported to

the El Paso Intelligence Center in 1999 were methamphetamine and/or amphetamine labs. These labs are usually far smaller than the larger laboratories operated

by the major methamphetamine trafficking organizations, but are equally as dangerous to law enforcement officers who encounter them.

In 1997, DEA reported 31 fires and 11 explosions associated with the 1,451 clandestine drug lab seizures in which DEA participated. In 1999, the National Clandestine Laboratory Database indicated that the number of reported incidents of fires

increased to 64, explosions 101, and labs which had explosives and/or booby traps,

80. The National Database also revealed 877 incidents in which children were

present during the seizure of a lab in 1999. The Drug Enforcement Administration

and state and local police organizations also must deal with the dangerous and expensive hazardous waste cleanup problems created by clandestine labs.

During the last two years, the national methamphetamine situation has changed

significantly. Until 1999, the methamphetamine problem was increasing at a dramatic rate. The national purity level for methamphetamine, as well as amphetamine, has gone down dramatically in 1999–2000. As previously stated, precursor

chemical controls, the international ‘‘letter of non-objection’’ program, and chemical

interdiction, combined with aggressive national and local law enforcement efforts,

have produced positive results. The average purity of methamphetamine exhibits

seized by DEA dropped from 71.9 percent in 1994 to 31.1 percent in 1999. The average purity of amphetamine exhibits seized by DEA dropped from 40.5 percent in

1994 to only 20.8 percent in 1999. Decreasing purity levels for methamphetamine

and amphetamine should have some effect on the number of emergency room admissions and overdose deaths related to methamphetamine.

Methamphetamine prices vary considerably by region. Nationwide, prices range

from $3,500 to $30,000 per pound at the distribution level. Retail prices range from

$500 to $2,500 per ounce and $25 to $150 per gram. Arrests in DEA methamphetamine investigations increased in Fiscal Year (FY) 1999, to 8,680, a 10% percent

increase from the 7,888 arrests in FY 1998, but a 41% increase over the 6,145 arrests in FY 1997, and a significant 113% increase over the 4,069 arrests in FY 1996.

The methamphetamine situation in Utah

Methamphetamine remains the most threatening drug in Utah. Mexican polydrug trafficking organizations continue to dominate methamphetamine distribution.

Methamphetamine produced in Mexico and southern California by Mexican nationals is readily available in ounce and multi-pound quantities. Utah also is a source

state for precursor chemicals.

Geographical remoteness in Utah creates an ideal environment for clandestine

laboratory operations, and an increase in laboratories has occurred during the past

few years. With this increase in methamphetamine laboratories, an increase in the

availability and use of methamphetamine in Utah has occurred. Methamphetamine

is now one of the top four drugs abused in Utah high schools.

In 1989, the Utah legislature implemented a precursor chemical control bill regulating ephedrine, pseudoephedrine and iodine. These laws placed restrictions on the

sale of various precursor chemicals. Over the last decade, this bill has had a positive

impact on reducing the availability of chemicals necessary for the manufacture of

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methamphetamine. It now appears that the increased difficulty in obtaining precursors has caused prices of methamphetamine to rise. Additionally, the difficulty in

obtaining precursors has caused the average purity of methamphetamine to drastically decrease. In FY 1997, average purity was 43 percent. Average purity dropped

to less than 27 percent in FY 1999 in Utah.

Since the DEA-Metropolitan Narcotics Task Force was created in July 1993, the

number of clandestine drug laboratory investigations has continued to increase,

making Utah the number one state for per capita methamphetamine laboratories.

It should be noted that, in 1997, Gen Barry McCaffrey, Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, recognized the DEA Metro Narcotic Task Force as one

of the finest multi-jurisdictional task forces in the country.

The Salt Lake office was upgraded to District Office status in May 2000. Currently, 19 Special Agents, as well as other personnel, are assigned to this office,

with 2 of the Agents posted to duty at St. George, Utah. Drug Enforcement Administration personnel participated in the seizure of over 100 clandestine laboratories

in the state of Utah in both 1997 and 1998, and Utah reported 208 clandestine lab

seizures to DEA in 1999.

Congressional action

In the last several years, Congress enacted important legislation to help prevent

methamphetamine manufacture, to deter trafficking in methamphetamine and its

precursor chemicals, and to encourage effective prevention, education, and treatment of methamphetamine abuse. The regulatory and enforcement framework for

precursor control was established with the ‘‘Chemical Diversion and Trafficking Act

of 1988’’ (Pub.L. 100–690). Twelve more chemicals were added to the regulatory

scheme by amendments in the ‘‘Crime Control Act of 1990’’ (Pub.L. 101–647). The

first bill specifically targeting the illicit production of methamphetamine (and the

related drug methcathinone, which has virtually disappeared as a clandestine product) was the ‘‘Domestic Chemical Diversion Control Act of 1993’’ (Pub.L. 103–200).

The 1993 amendment began to close the ‘‘legal drug exemption’’ that had allowed

traffickers to avoid regulatory requirements by buying their chemicals through thousands of ‘‘legal’’ FDA-approved tablets. The bill brought over-the-counter, single-entity ephedrine products under DEA regulatory control, and permitted DEA to add

other products by regulation. It also required registration of handlers of ‘‘list I’’ (formerly precursor) chemicals similar to those for controlled substances. In 1996, Congress enacted a major piece of methamphetamine-related legislation, the ‘‘Comprehensive Methamphetamine Control Act of 1996’’ (Pub.L. 104–237), most of which

became effective on October 3, 1996. The most recent enactment, the ‘‘Methamphetamine Penalty Enhancement Act of 1998’’ (Pub.L. 105–277, Div.E), lowered certain

quantity thresholds for mandatory minimum trafficking penalties.

The Senate Judiciary Committee, under Chairman Hatch, has developed landmark methamphetamine legislation, The Methamphetamine Anti-Proliferation Act

of 1999 [S.486]. This bill substantially contributes to national methamphetamine enforcement efforts by directing the Sentencing Commission to increase base level penalties for amphetamine so they are commensurate with those for methamphetamine,

and setting higher sentencing thresholds for the manufacture of methamphetamine

or amphetamine if it is determined that the criminal offense creates a substantial

risk to human life or the environment, or if this risk is to a minor or incompetent

person. It also prohibits the teaching, demonstrating, or disseminating of information on the manufacture or use of controlled substances to a person, knowing that

the person intends to use this information to commit a federal crime. Furthermore,

the bill provides for increased drug prevention, treatment, including medications development, and research.

PART II

MDMA: The drug

Primarily illicitly manufactured in and trafficked from Europe, 3,4-

Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), a Schedule I drug under the Controlled

Substance Act (CSA), is the most popular of the club drugs. Its origins can be traced

to Germany in 1912 where it was patented but never studied or marketed for

human consumption. In the 1970’s and early 1980’s some health care professionals

experimented with the drug in ‘‘introspective therapy’’ sessions, outside of FDA-approved research. DEA reporting indicates widespread abuse of this drug within virtually every city in the United States. Although it is primarily abused in urban settings, abuse of this substance also has been reported in rural communities. Although prices in the United States generally range from $25 to $40 per dosage unit,

prices as high as $50 per dosage unit have been reported in Miami.

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The drug is a synthetic, psychoactive substance possessing stimulant and mild

hallucinogenic properties. Known as the ‘‘hug drug’’ or ‘‘feel good’’ drug, it reduces

inhibitions and produces feelings of empathy for others, the elimination of anxiety,

and extreme relaxation. In addition to chemical stimulation, the drug reportedly

suppresses the need to eat, drink or sleep. This enables club scene users to endure

all-night and sometimes 2–3 day parties. MDMA is taken orally, usually in tablet

form, and its effects last approximately 4–6 hours. Taken at raves, the drug may

lead to severe dehydration and heat stroke, since it has the effect of ‘‘shortcircuiting’’ the body’s temperature signals to the brain. An MDMA overdose is characterized by rapid heartbeat, high blood pressure, faintness, muscle cramping, panic

attacks, and in more severe cases, loss of consciousness or seizures. One of the side

effects of the drug is jaw muscle tension and teeth grinding. As a consequence,

MDMA users will often use pacifiers to help relieve the tension. The most critical,

life-threatening response to MDMA is hyperthermia or excessive body heat. Recent

reports of MDMA-related deaths were associated with core body temperatures ranging from 107 to 109 degrees Fahrenheit. Many rave clubs now have cooling centers

or cold showers designed to allow participants to lower their body temperatures.

The long-term effects of MDMA are still under evaluation; however, research by

the National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda, Maryland, in 1998 directly

measured the effects of the drug on the human brain. The study revealed that the

drug causes damage to the neurons (nerve cells) that utilize serotonin to communicate with other neurons in the brain, and that recreational MDMA users risk permanent brain damage that may manifest itself in depression, anxiety, memory loss,

learning difficulties, and other neuropsychiatric disorders.

MDMA can produce stimulant effects such as an enhanced sense of pleasure, selfconfidence and increased energy. Its hallucinogenic effects include feelings of peacefulness, acceptance, and empathy. Users claim they experience feelings of closeness

with others and a desire to touch them. As such, because of the feelings attained

by the MDMA user, there exists a misconception that these drugs are relatively

safe. However, various researchers have shown that use of club drugs can cause serious health problems and, in some cases, even death. Used in combination with alcohol, some of these club drugs can be even more dangerous. Furthermore, MDMA’s long-term psychological effects can include confusion, depression, sleep problems,

anxiety and paranoia.

The ecstasy drug market in the United States is supplied and controlled by Western European-based drug traffickers. In recent years, Israeli Organized Crime syndicates, some composed of Russian e ́migre ́s associated with Russian Organized

Crime syndicates, have forged relationships with the Western European traffickers

and gained control over a significant share of the European market. Moreover, the

Israeli syndicates remain the primary source to the U.S. distribution groups. The

increasing involvement of organized crime syndicates signifies the

‘‘professionalization’’ of the MDMA market. These organizations have proven to be

capable of producing and smuggling significant quantities of MDMA from source

countries in Europe to the United States. DEA reporting indicates their distribution

networks are expanding from coast to coast, enabling a relatively few organizations

to dominate MDMA markets nationwide.

MDMA is clandestinely manufactured in Western Europe, primarily in the Netherlands and Belgium. It is estimated that 90% of MDMA distributed worldwide is

produced in these countries. MDMA production is a relatively sophisticated chemical

process making it difficult for inexperienced individuals to produce MDMA successfully. However, there are several manufacturing processes for MDMA and a multitude of ‘‘recipes’’ that are posted on the Internet. Most of the MDMA laboratories

are capable of producing 20–30 kilograms on a daily basis, although law enforcement authorities have seized some labs with the capability of producing 100 kilograms per day.

Normally, the MDMA is manufactured by Dutch chemists and transported and

distributed by various factions of Israeli Organized Crime groups. These groups recruit and utilize Americans, Israeli and western European nationals as couriers.

These couriers can smuggle anywhere from 10,000 to 20,000 tablets (2.5–5 kilograms) on their person and up to 50.000 tablets (10 kilograms) in specially designed

luggage. In addition to the use of couriers, these organizations use the parcel mail.

DHL, UPS. and U.S. Postal Service, Due to the size of the MDMA tablet, concealment is much easier than other traditional drugs smuggled in kilogram-size packages (cocaine, heroin and marijuana).

What brings these Drug Trafficking Organizations together is the enormous profit

realized in these ventures along with the fact the MDMA is not produced in the

United States. Although estimates vary, the cost of producing an MDMA tablet run

between $.50–$1.00. The wholesale, or first level price for MDMA tablets have

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ranged from $1.00–$2.00 per tablet, contingent on the volume purchased. This potential four-fold profit provides huge incentives for the laboratory owner or chemist.

Furthermore, manufacturing laboratories can realize these profits without coming

into contact with anyone except the first level transportation or distribution representatives. Once the MDMA reaches the United States, a domestic cell distributor

will charge $6–$8 per tablet. The retailer then turns around and distributes it for

$25–$40 per pill. Clearly, there is a tremendous profit realized in each function in

MDMA trafficking from the producer or clandestine laboratory operator to the transporter to the wholesaler to the retailer, then on to the consumer.

Overview of other ‘‘Club’’ drugs: An emerging epidemic

The use of synthetic drugs has become a popular method of enhancing the club

and rave experience. These rave functions, which are parties known for loud technomusic and dancing at underground locations, regularly host several thousand teenagers and young adults who use MDMA, LSD, GHB, alone or in various combinations. Users of drugs such as MDMA report that the effects of the drug heighten

the user’s perceptions, especially the visual stimulation. Quite often, users of MDMA

at clubs will dance with light sticks to increase their visual stimulation. Legal substances such as Vicks’s VapoRub are often used to enhance the effects of the drug.

‘‘Club’’ drugs have become such an integral part of the rave circuit that there no

loner appears to be an attempt to conceal their use. Rather, drugs are sold and used

openly at these parties. Traditional and non-traditional sources continue to report

the flagrant and open drug use at ‘‘raves.’’ Intelligence indicates that it has also become commonplace for security at these parties to ignore drug use and sales on the

premises. Tragically, many teens do not perceive these drugs as harmful or dangerous. These drugs are marketed to teens as ‘‘feel good’’ drugs. The following is a

brief summary of other selected club drugs.

Gamma HydroxyButyrate (GHB) is easily accessible at rave parties and is currently popular among teenagers and young adults alike. Commonly referred to as

a date rape-drug, GHB was originally used as a substitute anabolic steroid for

strength training. GHB has been used in the commission of sexual assaults because

it renders the victim incapable of resisting, and may cause memory problems. GHB

costs approximately $10–$20 per dose and is frequently mixed with alcohol. As of

January 2000. DEA documented 60 GHB-related deaths nationwide. Additionally,

the Utah State Medical Examiner’s Office reported two GHB-related deaths in the

last twelve months. The drug is used predominantly by adolescents and young

adults, often when they attend nightclubs and raves. GHB is often manufactured

in homes with recipes and ingredients found and purchased on the Internet. As a

result of the Hillory J. Farias and Samantha Reid Date-Rape Prohibition Act of

2000, GHB was designate a Schedule I drug under the CSA.

Gamma Butyrolactone (GBL), a List I chemical, is a precursor chemical for the

manufacturer of GHB. Several Internet sites offer kits that contain GBL, sodium

hydroxide or potassium hydroxide and directions for the manufacture of GHB. This

process is relatively simple and does not require complex laboratory equipment.

Upon ingestion, GBL is synthesized by he body to produce GHB. As a consequence,

some party goers drink small quantities of GBL straight. GBL increases the effects

of alcohol, and can cause respiratory distress, seizures, coma and death. The Salt

Lake City Police Department Sex Crimes Unit reported twelve known date rape

cases statewide involving GBL and GHB in the last year.

d-lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), listed as a Schedule I drug under the CSA,

first emerged as a popular drug of the psychedelic generation in the 1960’s. Its popularity appeared to decline in the late 1970’s, an effect attributed to a broader

awareness of its hazardous effects. Over the past decade, there has been a resurgence of LSD abuse, especially among young adults. Adverse effects of LSD include

panic, confusion, suspicion and anxiety. Liquid LSD has been seized in Visine bottles at rave functions. LSD is also sold at raves on very small perforated paper

squares that are either blank or have a cartoon-figure design. Most users of LSD

voluntarily decrease or stop using it over time, since it does not produce the same

compulsive, drug-induced behavior of cocaine and heroin.

As of August 1999, Ketamine, also known as ‘‘Special K.’’ was placed in Schedule

III of the Controlled Substance Act. Used primarily by veterinarians as an anesthetic, Ketamine produces hallucinogenic effects similar to PCP with the visual effects of LSD. Ketamine is diverted in liquid form, dried and distributed as a powder.

Price average $20 per dosage unit. Ketamine is snorted in the same manner as cocaine at 5–10 minute intervals until the desired effect is obtained.

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Legislative efforts

Ecstasy, as well as all other club drugs, have been scheduled under the Controlled

Substances Act (CSA), Title II of the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and

Control Act of 1970. Recently, due to the exponential growth and abuse of Ecstasy

and its devastating and potentially lethal effects. Senate bill S. 2612, was introduced by Senator Bob Graham and co-sponsored by Senator Charles Grasley. This

bill calls for the United States Sentencing Commission to amend the federal sentencing guidelines to provide for increased penalties associated with the manufacture, distribution and use of Ecstasy. Those penalties would be comparable to the

base offense levels for offenses involving any methamphetamine mixture. The bill

would also assure that the guidelines provide that offenses involving a significant

quantity of Schedule I and II depressants, including GHB and its analogues, are

subject to greater terms of imprisonment than currently in place. Furthermore, the

bill calls for greater emphasis to be placed on the education of young adults, the

education and training of state and local law enforcement officials and adequate

funding for search by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA).

In addition to S. 2612, a companion bill has been introduced in the House by Congresswoman Judy Biggert. H.R. 4553 is almost identical to S. 2612, except it encompasses all ‘‘club drugs’’, to include paramethoxyamphetamine, commonly refereed to

as ‘‘PMA’’. In recent weeks, it is believed that ‘‘PMA,’’ an Ecstasy analogue controlled by DEA since 1973, may be responsible for the death of three young people

in suburban Chicago. The three victims, an 18-year old female and two males, 17

and 20 years of age, are said to have frequented the same nightclub. These deaths

are being investigated by local authorities. At this time it appears that the drug

users thought they were taking MDMA, but ingested PMA instead.

Another bill relating to club drug abuse, the Hillory J. Farias and Samantha Reid

Date-Rape Prevention Drug Act of 1999, (Public Law 106–172), was signed by the

President on February 19, 2000. This legislation directed DEA to place GHB

(Gamma hydroxybutyric acid) in Schedule I (the DEA has since done so) and placed

the precursor chemical GBL on chemical List I.

Furthermore, Public Law 106–172 contains a statutory obligation that requires

DEA to establish a special unit to asses the abuse of and trafficking in GHB,

flunitrazepem, ketamine and other controlled substances (club or designer drugs)

whose use has been associated with sexual assaults. In addition, the Attorney General was directed to develop a protocol for the collection of evidence and the taking

of victim statements in connection with violation of the CSA—which results or contributes to sexual assault, crimes of violence or other crimes involving the abuse of

GHB and the other designer drugs. In addition, DEA and the FBI are obligated to

develop model training materials for law enforcement personnel involved in such investigations, and make such protocols and training materials available to Federal,

state, and local personnel responsible for such investigations.

Enforcement initiatives

Operation ‘‘Flashback’’

In an effort to target organizations and individuals that distribute and manufacture ‘‘club drugs,’’ DEA established Operation ‘‘Flashback’’ in July 1997. On July 2,

1998, MDMA was approved for inclusion under this Special Enforcement Program.

Since February 1998, active investigations have increased from 6 to 140, indicative

of the increased availability, and demand for, and law enforcement emphasis on,

club drugs. Operation ‘‘Flashback’’ seeks to achieve the following five primary objectives:

• Develop prosecutable cases against individuals and organizations that manufacture and distribute so-called club drugs.

• Develop intelligence links between domestic wholesale distributors and the foreign source of supply.

• Identify, arrest, and prosecute violators at a high level of distribution, including

the clandestine lab operators.

• Establish and coordinate an overall strategy for all domestic and foreign investigative efforts.

• Identify the command and control infrastructures of organizations that are distributing so-called club drugs.

Furthermore, this special Enforcement Program provides a mechanism to enforcement components in the field to fund undercover buys, confidential source payments, installation of pen registers and activation of Title III wiretaps. In addition,

it acts as a central depository for any and all information related to club drugs. This

database contains information on targets, organizations, arrests, seizures, modes of

smuggling, types of drugs and the logos/brand names they bear.

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Presently, DEA has several ongoing investigations into these trafficking organizations. One particular investigation of note was conducted by DEA’s Special Operations Division. The Special Operations Division is a joint national coordinating and

support entity comprised of agents, analysts and prosecutors from DOJ, the USCS,

the FBI and DEA. This investigation, entitled Operation Rave, focused on an

MDMA distribution cell that operated throughout the northeast and Florida. The

leader of this organization, an Israeli national, was responsible for the distribution

of approximately 150,000 tablets of MDMA per week. This and related spin-off investigations resulted in the arrest of 105 defendants, the seizure of 620,000 tablets

of MDMA and approximately $935,000 in U.S. currency. The significance of this investigation was the fact that it identified, for the first time, the involvement of

Israeli and Russian crime groups in MDMA trafficking.

In addition, DEA, in conjunction with the United States Customs Service (USCS)

recently seized two packages containing a total of 110,000 MDMA tablets which

originated in Madrid, Spain and were destined for Provo, Utah. Following a controlled delivery, two arrest were made leading to the identification of multiple individuals in Utah and Spain. To date, this investigation has revealed an organization

financed by Israeli nationals who directed the manufacture of MDMA in Amsterdam

and its transshipment throughout Europe. During the course of this investigation

and based upon information furnished to German authorities, 23,000 additional ecstasy tablets destined for Utah were seized in Germany.

Demand reduction initiatives

The increasing power and diversity of drug trafficking organizations operating

throughout the United States and abroad demands an equally authoritative and creative response. These drug trafficking organizations seek to entrench criminal enterprise in modern society; they attempt to lure the youth of this country into the dark

world of drug abuse and crime on a daily basis. As such, DEA is committed to developing and employing multi-faceted strategies to combat both drug trafficking and

drug abuse. With this in mind, DEA’s Demand Reduction program was created in

1986 in response to the widespread belief that both law enforcement and drug prevention were necessary components of a comprehensive attack against the drug

problem in the United States. Given the age of the targeted user population of

MDMA, DEA has created a very aggressive and comprehensive plan to bring this

issue to the attention of the American public. It should be noted that DEA’s Operations Division has organized a club drug conference scheduled for the latter part

of July 2000 in the Washington, D.C. area. Participants will include law enforcement personnel from around the world, leading researchers, clinicians, prevention

specialists, educators, and medical professionals to discuss the alarming resurgence

in use of MDMA and other club drugs.

In addition, the Salt Lake City District Office conducts Demand Reduction classes

approximately four times per month. These presentations are directed primarily at

the clandestine manufacture of methamphetamine and the dangers and methods of

detection associated with these laboratories.

Conclusion

Increasing methamphetamine production and abuse poses a unique challenge for

drug enforcement, both in Utah and throughout the nation. Clandestine laboratories

represent a substantial health and safety threat to communities. The flammable, explosive, toxic, and carcinogenic chemicals used in the manufacturing process pose

an immediate and long-term threat to law enforcement, fire department, and emergency services personnel, as well as the general public. Fires and explosions are a

constant threat in this type of environment. Moreover, the threat to the environment is substantial, due to the illegal and unsafe disposal methods of clandestine

methamphetamine operators.

MDMA abuse, although a relatively new phenomenon, has certainly taken parts

of this country by storm. The magnitude of the current MDMA problem cannot be

understated. The media coverage alone is indicative of the impact this drug has had

on the United States. One only has to review the dramatic increase in seizures over

the past twenty-four months to recognize the insidious upsurge of this drug. With

the 2002 Winter Olympics quickly approaching, Federal, state and local officials in

Utah must prepare for the tremendous influx of people into this area and the potential for drug abuse.

In conclusion, DEA will continue to utilize a multi-faceted approach employing

both prevention and enforcement strategies in targeting MDMA and methamphetamine trafficking and abuse. In this regard, DEA is working in conjunction with law

enforcement officials throughout Europe and Israel in an effort to identify, target,

dismantle and prosecute those organizations responsible for the proliferation of

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MDMA throughout the U.S. and Europe. furthermore, DEA endorsed and implemented elements of the national Methamphetamine Strategy that focuses on international drug trafficking groups, independent domestic methamphetamine operations, and rogue chemical companies that are responsible for the smuggling, production, and distribution of methamphetamine in the United States. Providing assistance and training to state and local law enforcement efforts, such as those in

Utah, is vital to DEA’s methamphetamine strategy.

I thank you for providing me the opportunity address the Committee and I look

forward to taking any questions you may have on this important issue.

Chairman HATCH. We’ll turn the time to you, Mr. Warner, appreciate having you here.

STATEMENT OF PAUL WARNER

Mr. WARNER. Thank you, Senator.

Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for the opportunity to appear before the Committee. I have the honor of being

the U.S. Attorney for the District of Utah, and I greatly appreciate

the opportunity to testify before the Committee on the critical problems of drugs and related crime in Utah.

Before I begin my specific remarks on the drug crime problem in

Utah, permit me to say, Senator Hatch, that I believe that few people serving in Washington are as well attuned to this issue as you

are, and that few have done as much as you have done to address

it. That support is needed and appreciated by law enforcement here

in Utah, and I believe around the country.

One focus of today’s hearing is the explosion of so-called ‘‘club

drugs,’’ Ecstasy, GHB, and others. About 10 years ago I had the opportunity to prosecute what may have been the first Ecstasy case

in Utah. It involved a young man who was manufacturing Ecstasy

and selling it to support his cocaine habit. At the time the case was

a rarity, and even today, we are fortunate that these club drugs

have not yet emerged as strongly as they have in other areas of the

country.

Still, the problem is real, and poised to get worse. For instance,

my office is prosecuting an Ecstasy importation scheme involving

a significant quantity of the drug, which would have supplied thousands of users. These drugs were being imported from Europe into

the United States, through Provo, under a complex scheme using

private carriers such as Federal Express, DHL, and UPS as apparently unwitting couriers. It appears the drugs were destined for the

streets of California.

Even though in the case of Ecstasy apparently was not intended

to be distributed here in Utah, in my view, it is only a matter of

time before we see increased use of these drugs by Utah’s kids. In

fact, I understand that the Utah Highway Patrol recently made a

significant seizure of Ecstasy intended for distribution in Utah during an automobile stop in Southern Utah. This matter is now being

reviewed for federal charges.

The target age group for Ecstasy is young people between the

ages of 16 and 25. Our children here face most of the same pressures as youth across the country, so it is no surprise that these

drugs would show up here. Indeed, because Utah still retains much

of its small-town innocence from an earlier, less troubled era, our

youth can be particularly susceptible to threats from invidious

‘‘club drugs’’ that are represented as ‘‘safe’’ or ‘‘clean.’’ My office, in

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conjunction with our law enforcement partners around the State,

will aggressively prosecute cases involving these drugs, in an effort

to prevent the threat from taking hold here, as have other drugs

such as methamphetamine.

I have been a prosecutor for almost a quarter of a century, and

I have been a federal prosecutor for the past 12 years. Before the

president nominated me to be the U.S. Attorney here in Utah, I

had served in the Utah U.S. Attorney’s office as First Assistant, as

chief of the Criminal Division, and as Violent Crimes Coordinator

for the office. Based on my experience, I can tell you without exaggeration that the meth problem in Utah today is the most serious

criminal threat we face in the public safety and the safety of our

well-being of our children.

There are two key components to the meth problem in Utah.

While I believe that these components certainly exist in other areas

of the country that are experiencing a serious meth proliferation

problem, they also rest on factors somewhat unique to Utah. The

first component is the home grown problem. The proliferation of

clandestine meth labs. Indeed, Utah has the dubious distinction of

having the highest per capita number of illegal methamphetamine

manufacturing operations of any State in the Union, and ranks

among the highest in the Nation in the absolute number of labs.

This part of the problem involves U.S. citizens operating small

labs and producing comparatively small amounts of very pure

meth. Approximately 266 such labs were taken down in Utah in

1999, and approximately 178 have been taken down so far this

year. The prevalence of these clandestine labs, sometimes called

‘‘tweaker’’ labs, after the common term for meth addicts, is a function of two facts; the highly addictive nature of methamphetamine,

and the ability of addicts to manufacture the drug themselves, a

factor not present with respect to drugs such as cocaine and heroin,

for example.

As the Committee knows, meth can be made using chemicals,

equipment, and over-the-counter drugs, all of which are fairly easy

to get. With your leadership, Senator, as well as efforts in the Utah

legislature, some key ingredients such as pseudoephedrine are now

harder to get in large quantities than they once were. However, determined lab operators are still able to get what they need. For instance, a common method used by tweakers to obtain

pseudoephedrine is to go to every store in the neighborhood and

buy up to the legal limit, 12 grams under Utah law. The recipe for

meth is well-known among users, and I believe that as the purity

of imported meth has decreased, the incentive for users to make

their own has increased.

The danger these labs pose to the community, and especially to

children in the homes where labs are set up, cannot be overstated.

First, while manufacturing meth is relatively simple, most of the

tweakers operating these labs are not exactly rocket scientists. The

process involves combining and heating very volatile chemicals,

and produces highly toxic fumes and residues. Second, the very nature of the meth addiction unfortunately ensures that the children

in the household will be ignored and abused. Our DEA agents can

tell you heart rending stories about addicted children found in appalling conditions in many of the labs they respond to. In fact,

18

there have even been reports of children in preschool and kindergarten playing make-believe games of cooking meth.

The second competent of the meth problem in Utah is what we

call ‘‘Mexican meth.’’ It results in part from our geographic location

as a convenient transshipment point. The result is a significant

number of what we call ‘‘pipeline cases.’’ This component of Utah’s

problem, and our responses to it, bear directly on controlling methamphetamine proliferation in Utah and throughout the United

States. Meth is being produced in massive quantities in large labs

in Mexico, as well as in Southern California and other western

States. Utah’s proximity to the national boarder, and the convergence of three primary travel corridors—I–70, I–80, and I–15— within the State combine to make Utah uniquely situated to serve

as a major transshipment point for this Mexican meth.

Unfortunately, we are finding that much of the drug is staying

in Utah and other intermountain States as well. For example, after

an 18-month investigation by the FBI and other law enforcement

agencies, just last week we broke up two major and interconnected

drug trafficking organizations operating in Salt Lake City and

Ogden. The take-down of the Olmedo and Sanchez drug trafficking

organization, or DTO’s, resulted in the indictment and arrest of

over 25 people and the seizure of at least 10 pounds of methamphetamine that had been imported into Utah, as well as other

drugs. These drugs were being distributed here in Utah, as well as

in Idaho and possibly Wyoming.

It is also an unfortunate fact that much of this particular component of Utah’s meth problem is a direct result of illegal entry by

criminal aliens into the United States, who then come to Utah.

Again, as a case in point, most of the individuals involved in the

Olmedo DTO, as well as many of those used by the Sanchez DTO

as runners and suppliers, were criminal aliens.

Additionally, let there be no mistake, these DTO’s have no effect

on children involved, as well. The most pernicious effect is in passing on the culture of drugs and lawlessness to another generation.

And again, without wishing to prejudice either the investigation or

the prosecution of the recently dismantled DTO’s, an example can

be found in those cases. Two persons in the Sanchez DTO have

been charged under the Federal law that provides additional penalties for anyone who employs or uses a minor in a drug trafficking

crime. The children involved in these cases deserve a chance to

have a different and better life than that of drug dealers.

Let me take just a moment to describe some of what my office

has been doing to address both the meth and the criminal alien

problems, which are related. As you know, Senator Hatch, when I

took office as U.S. attorney, I established two prosecutive priorities.

These priorities are meth and aggravated re-entry immigration

cases. With your support and the support of the Main Justice,

these initiatives are bearing fruit.

First, I was able to obtain two new drug prosecutors, which allowed me to establish within the office’s Criminal Division a new

drug section. Utilizing targeted resources provided by Congress and

allocated by the Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys, this section is

now staffed with four attorneys, including two who are dedicated

to OCDETF cases. Even while still staffing up, the results of this

19

section have been evident. For instance, fiscal year 1999, we indicted approximately 196 defendants in about 105 drug cases. This

represents a 65 percent increase in the defendants and 38 percent

increase in cases over fiscal year 1998. Yet the numbers alone do

not tell the whole story. During the last 12 months we have successfully dismantled three major drug trafficking organizations, including the Sundowners Motorcycle Club drug trafficking organization, and the recent bust of the Olmedo and Sanchez DTO’s, which

I also stated.

As a reflection of the growing problem with methamphetamine in

Utah and the commitment by federal law enforcement to attacking

the problem, allow me to provide a comparison of defendants indicted in OCDETF cases within the last 2 years. In fiscal year

1998, a total of 32 defendants were indicted in the District of Utah

through OCDETF investigations, many of whom were indicted for

methamphetamine offenses. By comparison, fiscal year 1999

OCDETF investigations resulted in the indictment of 91 defendants, and nearly all of those defendants were indicted for a meth

offense. So far in the fiscal year 2000, we have obtained indictments against 53 defendants in OCDETF cases, including the 31

defendants indicted as a part of the Olmedo and Sanchez DTO’s.

The point of relating these numbers is not only to inform the

Committee of what we are doing to tackle the meth problem in

Utah, but also emphasize the severity of the problem. Even with

the substantial and ever increasing number of defendants and

cases we are handling, sometimes it seems we’re only scratching

the surface of the problem. There seems to be an endless supply

of new cases.

The same can be said of the second prong of our initiative, which

involves aggressively prosecuting criminal alien cases. I understand that this can be a sensitive subject, and that the link between these cases and the meth problem may not be readily apparent to some. It must be emphasized that the criminal alien initiative is not targeted at our law-abiding Hispanic population. It is

that population we in large measure seek to protect. Indeed, the

code name for the investigation into the Olmedo and Sanchez

DTO’s was ‘‘Los Chacales,’’ which in Spanish means, ‘‘the Jackals,’’

and is a derogatory term within the law-abiding Hispanic community for drug dealers. It is my view that because of the prevalence

of Mexican men, and the convenience of Utah as transshipment

and distribution point, the criminal alien and drug trafficking cases

are intimately intertwined, and that we cannot get a handle on the

meth problem without also attacking the criminal alien problem as

well.

Thanks to your commitment, Senator Hatch, and the commitment of the Attorney General, we have added personnel resources

in the U.S. attorney’s office as well as at the INS to aggressively

pursue these cases. Again, we’re showing results. In calendar year

1996, our office indicted 80 criminal aliens. In 1997 194 such cases.

In 1998, 313. In 1999 over 250. So far this calendar year about 120

have been brought so far. The vast majority of the criminal alien

cases we are doing involve defendants with drug trafficking convictions, as well as lengthy criminal histories. In addition to the immiVerDate 11-MAY-2000 02:04 Sep 13, 2001 Jkt 073821 PO 00000 Frm 00023 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\C821.XXX pfrm03 PsN: C821
20

gration offenses, many of these are methamphetamine related

cases. Our program has been successful so far.

Finally, Mr. Chairman, let me briefly note a third aspect of our

drug crime initiative, the targeting of the illegal use and possession

of firearms by criminals. The link between the illegal use and possession of firearms and drug crime is well known, and here in

Utah, we have initiated Project CUFF—Criminal Use of Firearms

by Felons—to aggressively prosecute these cases. I am pleased to

say that both the name of the initiative and the resources to pursue it are a result of your efforts in the Senate. And let me be

clear, we are not prosecuting law-abiding citizens exercising their

constitutional right to keep and bear arms. Rather, we are targeting those felons who use guns to commit crimes, thereby endangering whole community and denigrating the rights of everyone

else. I have assigned a top AUSA to Project CUFF, and I am adding another one next month. The initiative has resulted in nearly

80 cases accepted for Federal prosecution since January.

In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, our drug problem in Utah is severe, and poses serious threats to our youth. And as some aspects

of the problem are unique to our district, the meth problem—and

the bigger broader drug problem—certainly is not. Yet, we are taking steps to tackle the problem. It is a problem we are tackling on

several fronts, including the home-grown, clandestine lab, the socalled Mexican meth, and staying ahead of the curve on the threat

posed by the new generation of club drugs. Your leadership, and

the support of the Department of Justice, has given us many tools

and resources to do this. I can assure you that whatever new resources you send us, whether in the form of funding or prosecutors

and staff, or in the form of improved laws such as your meth bill,

Federal law enforcement in partnership with our State and local

colleagues will put them to good use to turn the corner of proliferation of methamphetamine and other drugs in our communities.

I thank you, Mr. Chairman, and would be pleased to answer

questions at the appropriate time.

Chairman HATCH. Thank you, Mr. Warner.

Turn to Chief Greiner.

STATEMENT OF JON GREINER

Mr. GREINER. Thank you, Senator Hatch. My name is Jon

Greiner, Chief of Police of Ogden, UT and——

Chairman HATCH. Pull that mic just a little closer.

Mr. GREINER. I appreciate the opportunity to talk to the committee about the emerging drug threats on Utah’s youth. Also appreciate the opportunity to address this meeting today. I offer this

introductory statement. The statement given the celebration of this

country’s 226th birthday, that seems troubling to me as a military

veteran and one who has spent the last 27 years in law enforcement.

This is the statement: The single greatest threat to Utah and

this country’s youth today is the drug problems associated with

methamphetamines. The formula to produce that illegal substance

is; red, white and blue, one, two, three. That’s right; red, white,

blue, one, two, three. Sounds more like a football quarterback call,

doesn’t it?

21

Doesn’t it seem a little bit troubling that the sick demented

under culture of society would use this expression to show how

easy it is to produce this substance? The issue of attacking our core

values.

It surprises me that Utah ranks in the top five per capita for

methamphetamine abuse and manufacture, given our culture.

However, you only have to meet a meth user to understand how

completely addictive this drug—this illegal drug is. During my career I have seen the user, I have been to the labs from houses to

storage lockers. They can even put one in the trunk of a car now,

as you can see by some of the equipment you have up front. The

worst part is the precursors to make the meth which can be acquired at many local grocery, hardware or farm supply stores. The

second problem is the clean up necessary after the products are

blended or cooked together. The last issue is that most citizens

don’t relate to this problem, yet, because of the culture in Utah. So

things are bound to get worse in terms of labs and addicts before

they can get better. Utah citizens have to recognize this villain.

These addicts are committing crimes. They also, some of them, are

getting into gangs.

In northern Utah we have a strike force of narcotics officers that

work with DEA that works with the Attorney General that work

with the two Utah counties of Weber and Morgan. In their weekly

report to each chief of that local area, more than 30 percent of the

cases and arrests involve methamphetamine. The other troubling

piece of this report is that a disproportionate number of the people

involved in this activity belong to a minority class of people in the

State of Utah, and a significant number of that minority class involved with the meth are undocumented citizens who belong or associate with local gang members.

On June 27, 2 weeks ago, the Weber/Morgan Task Force, in conjunction and assistance to the FBI, arrested 16 people in our geographical area and served warrants where meth was recovered,

much of which Paul outlined just previously. The suspects were

mostly Hispanic descent, many were illegal, and the area of drug

dealing covered several western states and had connections into

Mexico. The total arrests from the FBI operation will probably approach 40 people.

The other emerging drugs of concern are the GHB and GBL

drugs. GHB being Gama-Hydroybutric Acid and GBL being

Gamma-Butyrolactome, both of which are drugs of choice for date

rapes.

In 1996 the San Francisco Bay area poison control center saw

their average of four to six GHB increase to eight to ten. In July

of 1996 both Los Angeles and San Francisco had reports of about

30 per month. Northern Utah, as is all of Utah, is starting to see

some of these same kinds of things happening. It is not uncommon

to hear rape victims report that they had gone to a party and

drank something. The next thing they remember is the morning

after and they have been sexually assaulted.

We have had the rave party reports and a few reports of the use

of the new GHB or GBL drugs, more commonly referred to as liquid Ecstasy. GHB’s similarity to Ecstasy is uncanny. Although it

affects users like Ecstasy, the chemical composition is not. Ecstasy

22

is a relative of the amphetamines alluded to earlier. GHB is found

naturally in every cell in the human body. It is considered a nutrient that enhances the sense of touch, yet GHB has a sedative effect

causing users to go to sleep or fall into a helpless, immobile state.

We need to become better prepared at dealing with these issues

as they emerge. On the enforcement side of this same issue, the

Weber/Morgan strike force has had some good seizures of the date

rape drug called Rohypnol before it got out to the mainstream of

user, at least in our area the last 2 years.

Many times you hear from law enforcement our needs and there

has been an excellent relationship between our congressional representatives and law enforcement. We talked 5 years ago about

problems with undocumented citizens, and you called a special conference in Salt Lake City to help start addressing that. It appears

that there will be some immigration and naturalization officers

working in Northern Utah sometime this year. The result of this,

Northern Utah has been benefited from some meth grant programs

that are helping us identify users, labs, and precursor suppliers

quicker. We are working on getting information into the hands of

parents so that they can see what meth and the new designer

drugs are all about. I offer to one of your aides one of the booklets

we pass out to our DARE graduates, at every DARE graduation,

as an example of that. We are working on ways to make identification of undocumented citizens more available to local law enforcement through fingerprint systems. The help is coming from our federal representatives for which we in law enforcement are very

grateful. Please pay attention to the diminishing amounts of these

grants. However, the Federal Byrne Grant reductions will cause

the scaling back of drug and gang units statewide, which I’m sure

Camille Anthony can address from her position.

The war is on to protect our youth. Aristotle once said, ‘‘The fate

of empires depends on the education of youth.’’ The key to reduced

demand for illegal drugs is an educated, well informed citizenry

that is primarily our youth and then everyone else in the community are aware of the real dangers of substance abuse. With this

awareness, each of us should be able to make our own informed decision and educate others on the perils of becoming involved in

drugs. Beyond that—beyond that the battle lines are already

drawn and we need to be as technically and tactically proficient as

we can be to meet the enemy head on and diminish or destroy

them.

Remember, it’s as simple as red, white, blue, one, two, three.

I thank you for your time today on this critical topic concerning

our future, and I would entertain any questions that you may have

at the appropriate time.

Chairman HATCH. Thank you. You did this magazine up here?

Mr. GREINER. There’s a national publication we work with, a national vendor to have that available. Our primary goal is to have

that available to our youth and their parents at the 5th grade level

of DARE so that they understand what it’s all——

Chairman HATCH. I hadn’t seen this before. This is the first one

I’ve seen. I’m just skimming through it but it really covers every

peril. How do you get it?

23

Mr. GREINER. I’ll put you on the mailing list. Actually we sell the

ad space and the advertisers in there pay for the magazine so

they’re free to the jurisdiction.

Chairman HATCH. So anybody—when you say ‘‘jurisdiction,’’ you

mean Weber County?

Mr. GREINER. Yes, sir.

Chairman HATCH. This is really excellent, thank you.

Mr. Wasden, we’ll turn to you.

Mr. WASDEN. Thank you, Senator.

Chairman HATCH. Try to top that.

STATEMENT OF ROY WASDEN

Mr. WASDEN. I can’t do it. I appreciate being able to be here.

Thank you for your leadership. We’ve had tremendous success and

through your leadership we’ve been spurred on in a number of efforts in Salt Lake and continuing in the last year, we have worked

together to build a crime reduction strategy on the statewide level,

with that have carried forward in county crime reduction strategy

and universal crime reduction strategies.

The drug problem is the number one component of crime. The estimates run at least 70 percent of all crime relates back to drugs

in one form or another. Based on that recognition, the resources to

deal with the crime related problems must exist. While we’ve made

tremendous progress with the resources and recognition through

the U.S. attorney’s office and prosecution, there still is a tremendous need that is not being filled and that needs the continued attention of filling spaces and completing the open positions that

have not been filled in local and federal offices, specifically the immigration services.

I don’t want to spend a great deal of time and repeat what you’ve

been told, other than to tell you that it is accurate; that there is

not enough information about the synthetic drugs, that in fact the

traditional drug scene, cocaine, heroin, and now unfortunately

methamphetamine, is being considered more of a traditional drug

problem, those continue. The synthetic drugs are not well informed

to our children. As we go through the DARE program with our children in schools, as we inform children and have DARE programs

of parents, clearly there’s a lack of information from every portion

of the community in what these threats are and how to deal with

the threat. Those programs must continue. We will never solve the

problem attacking the supply site.

Unfortunately my time in Salt Lake is very short, because of this

reason in closing my office I’ve not been able to write my remarks

for the hearings today. It will be with tremendous anticipation that

I move to a new job in California, and I appreciate the opportunity

of having worked with and addressed the problems, Senator, in this

format. You have been a resource to law enforcement in Utah and

I hope that I find that as I move to my new position.

Chairman HATCH. We really appreciate the service you’ve given

here, we are delighted to have you here with us today.

Mr. Morgan, you are going to be clean up here.

STATEMENT OF KENT MORGAN

Mr. MORGAN. Thank you, Senator. I’m used to that.

24

Chairman HATCH. If you can pull that mic up a little bit closer,

I want everybody to hear you.

Mr. MORGAN. I’m, of course, referring to at home, not in the office.

Senator, my job is to supervise the State’s prosecution of all felony controlled substance violations that occur in Salt Lake County.

Many of the cases that Mr. Warner has referred to we’ll be talking

about, at least briefly.

I would like to mention to the Senate that the District Attorney’s

office files over 8,600 felony charges each year. That amounts to

just over 6,300 cases. Of those total charges, more than half involve

charges that allege one or more violations of the Utah Controlled

Substance Act.

Chairman HATCH. Would you agree with the 70 percent figure,

pretty close to it?

Mr. MORGAN. As being the—— Chairman HATCH. Related to drugs.

Mr. MORGAN. As other crimes, I certainly would. If we have a

crime, a violent crime for example, a robbery, the motive for doing

a robbery is because the person needs drugs, the easiest way to do

that is to rob a drug store. The federal, State and local law enforcement agencies, prosecution officers and State crime laboratory personnel have recently become focused on the illicit and clandestine

manufacture of methamphetamine in Salt Lake County.

A disturbing trend shows that the manufacture, sale and use of

this controlled substance have reached alarming proportions. The

total number of cases filed since 1994 has steadily increased from

1,609 felony cases to over 3,300 cases last year. We find that the

controlled substance case load appears to double probably every 5

years.

There are four major crimes filed in a controlled substance case.

These crimes are: Distribution or Arranging the Distribution of a

Controlled Substance; the Possession of a Controlled Substance

With the Intent to Distribute a Controlled Substance; the Possession or Use of a Controlled Substance, also known as simple possession; and the fourth one is, Manufacture or Production of a Controlled Substance.

Distribution and Possession with Intent cases comprise about

half of the controlled substance case load, with felony and possession constituting about one third of the case load. The remaining

case load is composed of a variety of kinds of cases, those are clandestine laboratory, forgery, prescription or pharmaceutical frauds,

things of that nature.

Most disturbing are the statistics showing that prosecution of

clandestine methamphetamine laboratories are increasing at an appalling rate and that methamphetamine use is replacing cocaine as

a drug of choice by drug abusers in Salt Lake County.

In 1994 through 1997, the Salt Lake District Attorney’s office

prosecuted between 17 and 23 clandestine laboratory cases each

year. In 1998, this number increased to 91, and doubled to 161 in

1999, and that’s out of the 200 some odd in this case, you can see

quite a few of those are here in Salt Lake County. This trend continues to the first half of this year. Other sorts of violations just

don’t show the same increase in the rate of commission near that

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experienced with methamphetamine related crimes. The prosecution of methamphetamine labs is a complex process requiring considerable time and resources. There are no local resources to fund

any additional county prosecutors. The District Attorney’s office

has had to resort to funding from the Salt Lake City Police Department for a one half time attorney position, and has been placed in

the position of recruiting assistance from the Utah Attorney General’s Office in order to be able to prosecute these offenses with any

degree of the attention that is merited for these kinds of cases.

A clandestine lab endangers not only the person and confederates

conducting the illegal manufacture of the methamphetamine, but

endangers innocent individuals in adjacent and surrounding buildings who are exposed to the carcinogens, dangerous chemical fumes

and the risk of explosion. This danger continues long after the lab

is discovered and is dismantled. It is not unusual to find the infant

children and toddlers of the illegal meth lab cooks crawling

through the glassware and chemicals such as red phosphorus and

lye that have been used to manufacture the methamphetamine.

These children are taken to the hospital to be decontaminated and

given an examination. One case that comes vividly to mind left the

children in a state with clumps of hair falling out of their heads

and sores covering their little bodies. Property values plummet

when homes in the middle of nice neighborhoods are condemned

with no money available from the criminal or any other resource

to do the necessary clean up. Trash from methamphetamine manufacture has been dumped in the dumpsters of elementary schools

and in cemeteries.

The harmful effects of methamphetamine abuse have long been

established by the medical and legal community. It is distressing

to observe that those who have been convinced to abandon the recreational abuse of cocaine, are now turning to the cheaper and

more plentiful supply of locally produced methamphetamine. While

40 percent of controlled substance felony violations involve the illegal distribution or use of cocaine, felony crimes involving the legal

manufacture, distribution or use of methamphetamine now exceeds

32 percent of the controlled substance case load in the District Attorney’s office. Heroin is involved in 7 percent of felony controlled

substance violations, while marijuana and other kinds of drugs

make up the remaining 21 percent of the controlled substance case

load. A methamphetamine charge 10 or 15 years ago was a rare

case indeed.

A more recent occurrence in drug prosecution has involved the

frightening use of so-called ‘‘club drugs’’ known as Ecstasy and allegations of the use of GHB, the ‘‘date rape’’ drug, because law enforcement is presently configured to intercept adults selling contraband controlled substances to adults in rather open and obvious

markets, and it is not in a position to pose as an ‘‘addict’’ or teenager seeking thrills in a ‘‘rave.’’ The ability to prosecute what is

now becoming wide-spread abuse has been slow in coming.

The Salt Lake County District Attorney’s Office has prosecuted

only five MDMA, or Ecstasy cases, three of which were filed just

last month. This does not mean that only a few violations are occurring in Salt Lake County. For example, this past year a local

investigation, Mr. Warner referred to a local investigation out of

26

our office that resulted in the seizure of 250,000 Ecstasy pills that

were shipped from Spain to Provo, UT. It was learned that these

pills were legally manufactured in Holland, and were destined for

illegal distribution in the United States. This investigation is continuing.

The greatest difficulty in combating drug violations is to apply

resources in an effective manner. The availability of Federal funds

for direct prosecution efforts would be most useful. Federal prosecutions often depend on the ability of the State to obtain an underlying conviction. As I understand the bill, funds would be made

available to combat trafficking in methamphetamine to hire not

only law enforcement personnel, but to allow for hire new prosecutors, lab technicians and chemists. I applaud those efforts, and remain available to answer any questions you may have.

Chairman HATCH. Thank you so much.

Chief, I wonder if I could get you to just step aside for a minute.

Sherryl Bigelow, a mother of a methamphetamine addicted teenage

daughter, is scheduled to testify on the second panel, but she has

to leave at 2:30 p.m., so I think—I think I’ll take her testimony at

this time because her testimony is something I think that will be

beneficial to all parents and children in the audience and throughout the State. So I’d like to give her that chance now. I’d like you

to come right back up so I can ask some questions of you.

Mrs. Bigelow, we’ll take your testimony at this time, if you pull

the mike close to you.

STATEMENT OF SHERRYL BIGELOW, MOTHER OF A

METHAMPHETAMINE ADDICTED TEENAGE DAUGHTER

Mrs. BIGELOW. Thank you for accommodating my schedule.

Chairman HATCH. Pull that even a little bit closer. I know it’s

hard.

Mrs. BIGELOW. As I’ve sat here and listened to these gentlemen

give statistics and facts, I see the lab up there, it’s just been very

difficult because this is about my daughter. And while I told my

story many times, it’s always difficult.

One of the saddest things of all to me is I’m not alone. There are

thousands and thousands of other mothers who have sons and

daughters that they love who have been taken away from them because of methamphetamines.

My daughter is 19 now, and briefly I will tell you how she got

started. This is what I’m aware of. When she went into seventh

grade she had straight A’s, she was a great student, had a lot of

enthusiasm for sports and friends and animals. She came from a

very typical home. My husband and I are still married after 24

years. Yesterday our oldest daughter entered the MTC, began serving a mission for her church. We’re active in our church. I have

four children, two cats and a dog. Very typical—typical family.

Come eighth grade we started seeing a lot of red flags. Our

daughter’s clothing changed, her friends changed, she had a hard

time going to school, didn’t want to go to school, she had mood

swings and we just assumed it was hormones and adjusting to middle school, and I immediately got her into some counselling. And

our pediatrician, who is wonderful, directed us to some very good

counselors.

27

They diagnosed my daughter as having manic depression disease

and being anorexic. We went into counselling for 3 years. During

the 3 years she had a couple of suicide gestures, both times was

taken to the hospital, neither time was she tested for drug use. At

no time during the 3 years of our intense counselling did a counselor say, this could be drugs, this could be meth. Couple of times

I suspected.

When she’d go into the pediatrician for kidney and liver tests for

the anorexia, I asked if she would drug test her. And they couldn’t

drug test her without telling my daughter. My daughter’s also very

bright and she knew whenever she went into the doctor, she would

just not use for three days before she got to the doctor, in case the

drug test happened. So all of the drug tests that were done came

up clean. When she applied for a job she didn’t use for a few days

before the job drug testing, and again it came up clean.

So I assumed that it was the manic depression disease and being

anorexic, and tried other things such as letting her live with an

aunt and uncle in Seattle for a summer. Nothing helped. I didn’t

know what else to do. We were at the end of our rope.

Our darling daughter became angry, she became violent, she had

no desire to go to school, she was failing classes. I assume when

she was there, when I did get her there, she left as soon as I

dropped her off or I found out later that she would use in the restrooms at the high school.

At the end of her junior year I just started checking into places

that deal with troubled teens or rehab, but as far as I knew my

daughter was not drug addicted. We were just looking at the troubled teen issue.

One place I felt very comfortable with, my husband went with

me because it was so expensive and our insurance wouldn’t cover

anything and we could—just didn’t know what else to do. So we

went and I had my husband with me and we asked several questions, and finally they brought in a couple of girls that were in the

program. And there were 50 girls at the time and they pulled in

two girls who I’d never seen or met before, and as we told our story

they were convinced that she was using drugs, my daughter was.

But I still had no proof that she was.

I didn’t know what else to do, and we left the room and we were

excused and said thank you for coming, Mr. and Mrs. Bigelow, and

one of the girls put the names together and knew my daughter,

and told us how involved our daughter was in crystal. And to tell

you how naive I was, I couldn’t even figure out what they meant

by crystal. I’m thinking the little things that shimmer in the light.

I’m going, oh, she doesn’t have crystal in her room. Didn’t make

any sense to me until they put the word ‘‘meth’’ with it, and everything—everything was clear. Weight loss, not being able to sleep at

night, the suicide gestures, the mood swings, the not going to

school, the violent temper. Everything was so clear to me.

Needless to say we had her in this rehab for 11 months. She has

been out just a little over a year now. She did very well for the first

few months and then started using again. She’s 19.

While she was in the rehab we found out she had diabetes and

also heart damage. She’s not living at home, a couple of reasons;

one is that she knows as long as she’s using she can’t be at home.

28

She has two younger brothers and I don’t want the influence of her

use and the friends that she hangs out with, I don’t think are

healthy for my other children. I don’t want them at my home. Plus

it’s really hard to live with a meth user when they’re having a

mood swing and are violent and angry and hateful.

I don’t know where she is. When she calls me it’s from a pay

phone or a friend’s cell phone. I hear from her about once a week.

If it goes longer than that I start calling police stations and hospitals to see if she’s OK.

The most frustrating thing we’ve been through is having no

where to go financially with this. No help from insurance. And now

that she’s 19, I can’t put her in another rehab. She’s on her own.

I hope that when the time comes that she’s arrested that we can

work out some kind of a deal to get her to drug court or something,

because the only time I’ve seen her really humble is when she’s out

of her element, and I think if she were in a jail, I think that would

be a really appropriate place for her to be humbled and want to

change her life around.

It has been so difficult for our family, for her brothers, for her

family unit. She isolates herself from us. She didn’t go with us to

the MTC with her sister. And my daughter told me once, it feels

like she doesn’t have a sister. She has two brothers and her parents.

My daughter is two people. She’s the person who has the values

of our family, who is kind hearted and loving; and then there’s our

daughter who’s the meth user, and they are completely opposite as

night and day. I miss my sober daughter and I fear for my drug

addicted daughter.

I will be happy to answer any questions before I leave.

Chairman HATCH. Your testimony is very important because a

lot of people don’t realize—a lot of people in Utah don’t realize— the tremendous difficulties that we have in this State from meth

use. And these are descent kids that get sucked up into it, and next

thing you know they’re lost. Like you say, it completely changes

their personality, it completely ruins their lives. I can’t tell you

how much we appreciate your willingness to come and tell us about

this, because hopefully parents all over the State will start to realize that this is a real menace to our State, and not just here but

all over, and I applaud your courage and welcome your desire to

help other families recognize the signs of drug abuse and addiction,

so that’s important.

You’ve listed a number of these signs, telltale signs parents

should be looking for. I’d just like you to just take a minute again

and list some of the signs that suddenly you realized amounted to

methamphetamine, and then I’m going to ask these law enforcement people a little bit about it so everybody in Utah can understand this is not some little insignificant problem.

Mrs. BIGELOW. The first sign that we saw was change in her

clothing, from being kind of the cute stylish look, she was wearing

baggy clothes, really baggy T-shirts and pants. The second sign was

the music that she listened to became hard rock, rapping gang kind

of music, is what I call it. Then we saw the grades fail. Apparently

she was smoking and using alcohol and marijuana for about a year

before the grades fell.

29

Chairman HATCH. Before she started on meth you say?

Mrs. BIGELOW. Well, it was probably even 21⁄2 years before she

started on meth. She escalated to that.

Chairman HATCH. People don’t realize, they take marijuana and

think it’s really not that bad a drug, but the fact of the matter is,

it is a gateway to other drugs.

Mrs. BIGELOW. And so is tobacco and alcohol with kids who grow

up in a family where that is not used, and so we looked at tobacco

and alcohol as gateway drugs also for her in her situation.

After the grades started failing the friends changed, and then

she would want to be gone for sleep overs. She’d leave on Friday

or Saturday night for a sleep over, and we would say, you know,

it’s your turn to have friends over at our house. But she never

wanted to be at our house, that was a problem. We found out later,

we get a lot of honesty when you’re in rehab, that when we would

drop her off at a friends or she’d say she’d be at a friends, she’d

call us at 10 or 11 p.m., caller ID would show that’s where she is,

but she would immediately leave and be somewhere else for the entire night. When we would pick her up in the morning she would

be where we dropped her off at. So we had no idea that’s what was

going on. But not wanting to be at home.

She refused to go on vacations with the family. We’d have a vacation planned and she would refuse to go. That should be a sign.

They can’t be away from their drugs that long, plus they’re not

comfortable around the family, they have to hide things somewhere.

Then getting her to school was a real challenge. She would want

to sleep and it was tough getting her out of bed. It’s another thing

that was interesting to me that teachers didn’t pick up on it a little

more or have a suspicion and call and say, hey, we think there’s

a problem. But her school attendance was crummy, her grades

went from A’s to B’s to C’s to D’s then just completely failing.

She was nonfunctioning. Suicide gestures, we had her in and no

one drug tested her in the emergency room, and both times I assumed she was high. Suicide gestures should be a red flag.

Arguing with the family, not getting along with people she used

to get along with. Violent outbursts came later.

One friend of mine the other day said, I see all these red flags

but I keep waiting for one more before I know for sure. I keep waiting for one more. I wish that I would have known when she was

in eighth grade or seventh grade instead of when she was 17 going

on 18. I think we would have stood a better chance of getting her

off if I had more time.

Chairman HATCH. This has been very helpful, and one of the

problems you’re having is—you’ve had is getting the proper type of

treatment if you don’t have the resources to be able to pay for it.

That’s one reason we passed the methamphetamine bill, my bill

last year got through the Senate, we still haven’t got it through the

House. There’s millions of dollars in there for rehabilitation and

treatment programs, and in fact the justice bill was held up on one

issue, the gun issue. Recognize that we had more money for treatment in that bill than we do for law enforcement, although we have

an adequate amount for both. And it’s all got caught up in politics

rather than doing what’s right.

30

But to make a long story short, you’ve been very helpful to us

here today and to parents all over this State, and I know it takes

courage for you to do this and we know it’s terrible to have to relive

it, but you’re helping a lot of people here today, I just want to

thank you personally. I think we promised you’d be able to go by

2:30 p.m., and we better let you go.

Mrs. BIGELOW. OK. Thank you.

Chairman HATCH. Chief, if we could get you back. Thank you

very much.

Now, Mr. Marshall, you know, the administration has pointed

out that we’ve had a 13 percent decrease since 1997 in drug abuse

among teenagers, but that kind of hides the problem. For instance,

use among teenagers since 1992 has increased 129 percent for

marijuana, 80 percent for cocaine, 100 percent for both crack and

heroin.

Additionally, the perception of youth drug use is confined to our

Nation’s urban areas is proven to be mistaken. According to a recent report funded by the DEA on illegal drug use among teens, it’s

notably higher in rural America than in urban and suburban areas.

If we look at the map we had up there, it looks like the meth problem is primarily from the Mississippi River west, at least as far as

methamphetamine lab shut downs go, but it’s moving rapidly towards the east. Years ago it was basically just in the west, and it’s

just a matter of time before it engulfs the whole country.

Now, the report of the DEA found that eighth graders living in

rural areas as compared to eighth graders is urban areas, 4 percent

have tried amphetamines, including methamphetamine; 30 percent

are more likely to use cocaine; 30 percent are more likely to smoke

marijuana; and 83 percent more likely to use crack cocaine.

Now, this is particularly troubling to me and my constituents

from the mostly rural State of Utah, and we’re having lots of problems out here now. What do you think accounts for this drastic increase in rural drug abuse and what is your strategy for helping

to bring this down or bring these numbers down, Mr. Marshall?

Mr. MARSHALL. I think really a couple factors account for it.

Number 1 is the ease of communications and information; perhaps

the internet, perhaps just general communications in our country.

People are better informed all over the country about what’s going

on; therefore, I think that people in rural areas who were not many

years ago when I was a child, for instance, just not exposed to that

sort of stuff.

I think that the modern world has made our society more mobile

and that sort of stuff, but I think more importantly, Senator, we’re

seeing in the drug world that the drug trafficking organizations

themselves are becoming more aggressive at marketing their products, and I’ll give you some examples of that.

The Colombian groups, for instance, when they got into the heroin market, they began selling heroin, a kilo of heroin with every

500 kilos of cocaine as a condition of selling the cocaine to their established customers, and so those customers would then take the

heroin, which at the time of a new product for the Colombian drug

dealers, and they would have to create new markets for it.

We’ve seen the Mexican drug trafficking organization, Mexican

based drug trafficking organization, we’ve seen them actually try

31

to create new market for methamphetamine, and that’s what has

accounted for the spread of methamphetamine. But most key is

that a number of years ago in the smaller areas and in Salt Lake

City, for instance, probably if a person wanted to introduce drugs

into this community or Tyler, TX near where I grew up, there

would have to be someone in that community that could reach out

and know a section in Los Angeles or Houston or New York or

Miami, you know, in order to bring drugs into these communities.

What we see in today’s world is that the drug trafficking organizations themselves are seeing opportunities to market their poison

and they’re actually moving their own organization representatives

into many of these smaller and mid size cities, and they’re consciously attempting to create new markets in these places. They

feel like in a smaller place there might be less of a law enforcement

threat, they feel like there might be less awareness, might be less

vigilance against the problem, and I think they’re consciously marketing this.

Now, as far as DEA strategy. We’re trying to increase our presence in smaller places. For instance, we’ve increased our presence

in Salt Lake, we’ve recently opened an office in St. George, we

would like to open an office in Ogden, we want to go in such places

in the country as Lufkin, TX and Tyler, TX and places like that

with the presence, and we are submitting, once again, in budget

year 2002 a Domestic Enforcement Initiative that would increase

the number of agencies that we have on our payroll and will allow

us to do that.

Now, other things that we’re doing, obviously we’ve talked a lot

both over at the DEA office and here to a lesser degree, about law

enforcement cooperation. And I think that DEA and federal government need to serve as catalyst to protect law enforcement cooperation, to promote intelligent sharing, to promote not a federal solution to these problems, but a national solution where we can all

work better together.

Chairman HATCH. We’re happy to have you as the new leader of

the DEA. You have the right idea, just exactly—you have so much

experience, like I say, you’re the first one who’s come up through

the ranks to become head of the DEA, and that’s pretty impressive.

Mr. Warner, you and I have worked on a couple of problems

here. Tell the folks here in the audience how easy it is to get off

of methamphetamine.

I’ve put that in a sarcastic way, haven’t I?

Mr. WARNER. I was going to say I wish that it were easy to get

off methamphetamine.

Our experience is not dissimilar to what Mrs. Bigelow described

with her daughter’s relapse. We have seen time and time again defendants in our criminal justice systems who are basically meth addicted and they’re in our system and they’re coming back to our

system because they have been in both the criminal justice system

as well as rehab, sometimes incarceration, sometimes in a private

facility, but—and I don’t have statistics——

Chairman HATCH. How many years does it take to be able to rehabilitate some teenager that’s been on meth, or anybody else for

that matter?

32

Mr. WARNER. Well, in my experience just around 3 years

because——

Chairman HATCH. That’s if you use an intensive Federal rehabilitation program?

Mr. WARNER. That’s right. In terms of us seeing people that actually can successfully lick the problem, and obviously individuals

differ, but we’re talking long-term intensive.

Chairman HATCH. And a lot of money.

Mr. WARNER. And a lot of money.

Chairman HATCH. Do they completely lick the habit in 3 years?

Mr. WARNER. I don’t think——

Chairman HATCH. The desire for these type of drugs?

Mr. WARNER. Obviously I’m a prosecutor, not a medical doctor.

But my experience has been that’s something they’ll deal with the

rest of their lives. Psychological addiction, even if they meet and

beat the other, these are people we see in our system that are

fighting this addiction for the remainder of their lives.

Chairman HATCH. Doctors tell me you never get rid of the desire,

you’re just able to handle it better after you go through a true rehabilitation. Is that your experience, the rest of you? You’re all

nodding your heads yes.

Let me ask you, Chief and Roy and Kent, as I mentioned in my

opening statement, most Utahns know methamphetamine is a horrible destructive drug. I’m not sure that’s a correct statement, some

Utahns, not all. Among methamphetamine users there are innocent

children and family members who do not use methamphetamine.

You’ve mentioned getting parents who have set up a lab such as

this in their home and they have little children addicted to methamphetamine, and that’s happening all the time here in Utah. Am

I wrong on that? You’re all saying I’m not, I’m right.

Can you please explain to the folks here, everybody who is interested in this, what kind of damage you’ve seen to the children,

spouses and neighbors of people who produce methamphetamine in

their homes.

Chief and then Roy then Kent.

Mr. GREINER. We’re having a significant number of children that

become instituted in foster care programs that are becoming what

we, not affectionately, refer to as drug babies. Even my secretary

who really loves children has found that more and more children

that she picks up and helps in the foster care program are a result

of these kinds of environments. They’re children of people who are

involved in the drug culture. They bring the product into their

homes. It’s so easy for them to make it any more, particularly the

methamphetamine. But by accident they’re getting themselves exposed, or if not procuring the life cycle of birth.

It’s a real problem and we’re getting to the point where we’re

being just like big cities in rural Utah. We’re getting those drug addicts as children who have, through no consequence of their own,

been exposed. And that’s just increasing every year.

Chairman HATCH. Anybody else care to entertain that?

Mr. MORGAN. Why don’t I. One of the consequences that you’ll

see is the labs set up——

Chairman HATCH. You need to pull that up.

33

Mr. MORGAN. Thank you, Senator. When you see a lab put together, a meth lab, what they’ll do is rent a home in a nice neighborhood; it’s conceived from the police, everybody knows criminals

aren’t in our neighborhoods, and over a period of time cook whatever meth they need. They sell the methamphetamine and then

usually about 3:00 in the morning on Friday we’ll ruin their party

and serve a search warrant. That’s not the end of the game. What

happens at that point is the drug enforcement agencies, the law enforcement agencies will take out, along with the State crime lab,

any of the contaminated materials and chemicals that are used to

directly make the methamphetamine. What’s left behind is all the

chemicals that were used that are now seeping into the walls.

Chairman HATCH. They’re highly toxic.

Mr. MORGAN. They’re toxic carcinogens. They’re now no longer

explosive, but they stay in the walls and cause cancer and all kinds

of problems.

Chairman HATCH. Explosive. These things being set up, that is

explosive?

Mr. MORGAN. While it’s cooking, it’s a bomb.

Chairman HATCH. Bomb waiting to go off.

Mr. MORGAN. Right. These common chemicals like lye, red phosphorus, iodine, things of that nature, themselves in small amounts

are very harmless. When you concentrate them and the leftover

chemicals after the cooking process is going to be permeating off

this room. We take the meth cooks to jail, DEA goes back to what

they’re doing, and the rest of us go back to what we’re doing. Then

the landlord shows up, and the landlord now has a multi—tens of

thousand dollar bill he’s going to have to do to clean the place up

to even rent it, much less sell it to somebody else.

In the meantime, he can’t do anything because he doesn’t have

$30,000 in his pocket, and that home just sits there. It sits there

for years at a time waiting until somebody will come in and take

the loss and clean the place up so they can sell it to somebody else.

It’s right in the middle of the neighborhoods where we live and

all the other property values around this house go down as well.

That’s just the economic consequences. And that’s in addition to the

human suffering.

Mr. WASDEN. Senator, Kent describes a real problem. Then

there’s the unscrupulous landlord who may well not clean it up and

rent the property. The meth department and Salt Lake County are

taking a strong role in becoming very involved as we close labs in

determining and setting standards about how those properties need

to be closed and made safe for the community. And that’s an

emerging problem.

A couple numbers I want to give you. In February 1999 the meth

and drug initiative, we’ve taken 155 children out of homes of—we

now do a hair test on those children to see what is in their system.

A long term hair test allows a longer period to review. Thirty-seven

percent test positive for methamphetamine and will go through the

withdrawal and have that on board as a dependent drug thing

they’ll have to deal with.

Chairman HATCH. This is shocking when you think about it, but

2 years ago Utah was the third largest methamphetamine shut

34

down State in the union. Where are we ranked today in the year

2000, or even 1999, do you know?

Mr. WASDEN. In the number of lab shut downs, I think number

one.

Mr. WARNER. Per capita we’re probably at the top or near the top

in terms of raw numbers. I heard around number nine in terms of

just the raw numbers.

Chairman HATCH. We’re at the top or near the top for methamphetamine lab shut downs. If that doesn’t tell us something, we

don’t know what will.

Did you have a comment on that, Donnie?

Mr. MARSHALL. I was just going to possibly get the chart back

up, but I believe it is eight or nine or something like that. I know

that number one is California and—— Chairman HATCH. Compared to millions of people. If you take a

per capita we’re right in there.

Mr. MARSHALL. I haven’t done that kind of comparison. We’ll do

a little research on that and get you an answer for the record. And

even looking at raw numbers, see Utah is one, two, three, four,

five, I only see about five or six States that have higher than Utah.

Chairman HATCH. It’s shocking because this is a great State, we

have great people in this State, very family oriented. But here we

have one of the major methamphetamine shut downs of the States

in the Union.

We’re running out of time and I want to get the second panel on,

just want to ask just a little bit more here about club drugs from

all of you, and then I’ll submit questions in writing so we can make

a record. If you could answer those in writing I’d sure appreciate

it.

But as we’ve heard about recent use, the highly potential toxic

so-called club drugs they’re designing, such as Ecstasy and GHB,

that teenage use is soaring, it’s out of control.

Now, we have also been told by Utah law enforcement the problem is going on in Utah. Many teens do not perceive these drugs

as harmful, as you noticed on the television clip that Mr. Marshall

showed. They don’t think of them as harmful or dangerous. They’re

using them at all night dance parties called raves, which occur

every weekend across the country, including here in Salt Lake

City. And indeed between 1998 and 1999 use of Ecstasy among

twelfth graders increased by 56 percent and use among tenth graders increased about 33 percent. That’s just in 19—between 1998

and 1999.

And while GHB has received recently more negative attention

due to the several teen deaths attributed to its ingestion, it also remains ubiquitous or pervasive at these parties.

Now, if each of you could just quickly respond to the following

questions: Are you in fact seeing an increase in these club drugs,

and if so what action is DEA and local law enforcement—what action are you taking to target these new drugs that are apparently

being marketed to teens, and are law enforcement agencies working together to address the drastic rise in importation of Ecstasy,

and last but not least, are these drugs being manufactured here in

Utah, these club drugs, or are they primarily being imported from

elsewhere or from out of State? Now, if the drugs are being imVerDate 11-MAY-2000 02:04 Sep 13, 2001 Jkt 073821 PO 00000 Frm 00038 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\C821.XXX pfrm03 PsN: C821
35

ported into Utah, where are they coming from. That’s a lot of questions, I thought I’d ask them all. Start with you, Mr. Marshall.

Mr. MARSHALL. Let me address each of those. With regard to increased use. Absolutely we are seeing increased usage, not only in

Utah but nationwide. I think that it is attributed to the fact that

there’s a lesser perception of risk of these drugs among teenagers,

and I think that these drugs are being portrayed in the media and

in movies on the supernet as harmless drugs.

What are we doing about it? We have very recently, and I say

very recently, going back about a year when we began to notice

this as a—just a mushrooming problem, we actually headed up an

investigation that targeted what we perceived at the time to be the

biggest Ecstasy importation ring in the country. That was Operation Rave, and I referred to that in my statement so I won’t repeat the results of that. But what we found was that in fact Ecstasy is being manufactured primarily in Belgium and The Netherlands, and it’s being brought into this country by European, Russian and Israeli organized crime. We have seen a few instances of

Ecstasy being manufactured in the United States.

Now with regard to the other——

Chairman HATCH. The Netherlands have become central because

they have a wide open drug use. In other words, it’s legal to use

drugs.

Mr. MARSHALL. Tremendous problem. They refer to it as a great

experiment, how successful it is, but the surrounding countries——

Chairman HATCH. I’ve had top law enforcement from France and

the other surrounding areas say it’s a cesspool there and it’s affecting all the other nations. I don’t mean to malign the Netherlands,

but it’s a dog gone mess, and now you’re saying a lot of that mess

is coming to our country because they allow the making of these

drugs in that area.

Mr. MARSHALL. No question about it.

Now, what should we do to combat Ecstasy and these other

drugs? Number 1, greater law enforcement and public awareness,

and we’re starting a campaign with the DEA to do that. The first

step of that is a national club drug conference. Second, we need to

have more law enforcement cooperative efforts against it. I think

third we need to educate the public, teenagers and law enforcement

as well as ourselves.

I’ve got to tell you, many people in law enforcement are not yet

aware of this problem, and they see these raves and they see the

clubs and they simply don’t realize what’s going on there and what

they’re seeing, and I think we can do a better job and have started

doing a better job focussing that kind of attention onto it.

Chairman HATCH. Thank you. Anybody else care to comment?

Mr. WASDEN. Quickly, Senator. We’re seeing the increase where

there’s raves, the drugs are—we have ongoing investigation. We’ve

made the club drugs part of our initiative with the DEA and we

just lack resources. We do not have the resources to—it’s a whole

new problem. We’ve had to have legislation passed in Utah recently

that’s gone into effect, and so these things are an emerging problem that we will need resources on and we need just a lot more

help.

36

Mr. WARNER. Senator, I want to emphasize, I agree with all

that’s been said here. Unfortunately we in law enforcement and

prosecution will never successfully, as has been stated, prosecute

the drug problem out of business.

It is a community problem. It is a society problem, and it’s one

that all facets of society has to come together on its education aspect is so critically important, because by the time we see the problem, you know, barn doors are open and the horses are gone and

we see the unfortunate results. But the reality is many, particularly on these club drugs, it’s really going after our youth, one of

the most volatile segments of our society, and awareness and education have got to be an important part of that.

Chairman HATCH. Very susceptible to that type of youth activity.

Mr. WARNER. Absolutely.

Chairman HATCH. I happen to like our mayor in Salt Lake very

well, but he’s a little bit—he’s disappointed in the DARE program,

which is—do you have any advice on that, because I’ve always be

a supporter of it, but you know, I don’t—I’m not positive how well

it’s working. Mr. Wasden, you mentioned—— Mr. WASDEN. The DARE program has undergone criticism and

some may have been appropriate. It’s important to look at the

agenda of the research and look at all the research if you’re going

to evaluate DARE, as well as recognize DARE is trying to move

into the future.

We have a long-term plan clearly focussed on young kids, elementary, junior and high school, and even into college, with information. And if that information isn’t available, they’ll go to the

club when they’re old enough and be offered the drug and not know

about it and experiment, I mean, the information has to be there

and available, whether through DARE or another program, we

have to have the education.

Chairman HATCH. Well, I don’t know what to do. I’ve been a

strong supporter of DARE and I don’t want to ignore our mayor,

because he understands this area and is very concerned about it.

So it’s my impression that it’s a program that’s been run for a few

years, but it really is still just starting to generate what needs to

be done.

Is it making headway?

Mr. MORGAN. Let’s keep in mind the people using club drugs

aren’t 18-year-old drug addicts on playgrounds near the corner. It

is the 14-year-olds that are the people who are taking the drugs.

And there is something very positive about the role of a policeman

that a school can count on, depend on, and I think the criticism directed at DARE with the policeman being the teacher of the effects

of drugs is ill founded and just ill advised, criticized on that basis.

Chairman HATCH. I’m going to submit questions with regard to

how gangs develop as a result of drug abuse and what happens

when you have criminal aliens in the country that literally are

bringing drugs with them causing underlying problems of our society, but I’ll put those in writing. But I really want to express my

appreciation to all of you being willing to appear today, and I hope

that everybody in Utah pays strict attention to what you’re telling

us because we’ve got a real problem here, and we need to nip it

in the bud before it goes much farther.

37

Thank you all for being here, I really appreciate it. Let me just

also recognize as being here in the audience Lamont Tyler, the

Utah House of Representative. Mr. Tyler, where are you?

We’ve got David Joe from the Salt Lake County District Attorney. Dave, where are you? He’s been here.

We’ve got Patrick Flemming, from the Utah Division of Substance Abuse. Mary Lou Everson. Vern Larsen from Safe and Drug

Free Schools from the Utah State Office of Education. Janor

Numus of the Utah Alcohol Foundation. And Jamie Roberts, director of the Rape Recovery Center in Salt Lake City. So we’re really

honored to have all of you here.

Chairman HATCH. We’re now pleased to introduce a second panel

of witnesses. This panel will discuss the effects of the drug problems along the Wasatch front, and our first witness will be Dr.

Shari Welch, an emergency room physician at LDS Hospital. I just

came from the emergency room so I’ll be interested in that. She’s

treated a number of GHB overdose and has seen firsthand the terrifying side effects of that drug that too few young people understand.

Next I’d like to mention we’re pleased to have with us Colleen

Taylor, the president of Utah’s PTA, working closely with parents

and teachers around the State. Ms. Taylor has a good understanding of the various perils facing our Utah youth today, including drugs, and we’re really honored to have you here.

We also welcome Steve Allred who is the Utah County Human

Services Specialist in drugs and alcohol. We commend his work in

treating these conditions and we look forward to your sharing your

expertise in this area as well.

And finally we have a young person here today who’s going to

testify anonymously about his personal involvement in local clubs

and raves, and his testimony is important because it will help all

of us gain insight into the kinds of illegal drugs found in our area

night clubs and parties, and I really appreciate his willingness to

testify or to talk to us today. So I’d like to welcome each of you

here.

We’ll start with you, Dr. Welch, first. Now if you could summarize your testimony, I know that we’re supposed to finish at 3 p.m.,

we’re not going to make it. But I’d like you to, if you could, summarize and then we’ll go from there.

PANEL CONSISTING OF DR. SHARI WELCH, EMERGENCY ROOM

PHYSICIAN, LDS HOSPITAL; COLLEEN TAYLOR, PRESIDENT,

UTAH PTA; STEVE ALLRED, SUBSTANCE ABUSE PREVENTION

AND TREATMENT PROGRAM MANAGER, UTAH COUNTY DIVISION, HUMAN SERVICES; AND ANONYMOUS YOUNG PERSON

STATEMENT OF DR. SHARI WELCH

Dr. WELCH. Thank you, Senator. What I’d like to do, with an eye

on the clock of course, is present to you how some of these patients

look and why we are so worried in the emergency room about these

club scene drugs.

For us here locally, at least according to physicians in the University of Utah and at our hospital, LDS, it’s really GHB. I know

nationwide Ecstasy is making its way through, but GHB is really

38

the problem we’re dealing with, and actually Mr. Marshall kind of

showed you some of that.

I’d like to tell you about a case actually last week in the emergency room, because I think she’s the prototype for what we’re seeing with these drugs. It was a 19-year-old woman who had been

planning on going dancing with her girlfriends, and this is someone

who has no experience with drugs, she’s lead a very sheltered lifestyle, she’s active in her church, in sports and so forth, and then

planned to go dancing at the clubs.

She began sipping a Coke and her girlfriends started laughing,

and when she asked what was the joke, what was so funny, they

told her that they’d put something in her drink. And this was very

atypical for this group of girls. She couldn’t taste it, she couldn’t

smell it, couldn’t see it, and so she finished the beverage not thinking anything would happen.

The next thing that she recalled, she woke up in the emergency

room at LDS on a respirator with parents worried at her bedside

requiring life support to stay alive. This was 3 hours later, and

here’s what had happened in between—and you have to appreciate

that these are not things that we’re used to seeing, drug scenes on

the street. Usually by the time I have contact with someone using

amphetamine or cocaine, by the time there are health problems

they are well along in terms of their addiction and their life-style,

they’ve committed to it.

This GHB is something totally different. These are kids not doing

drugs, they have no experience, they’re making a wrong choice either directly or inadvertently and they’re falling prey to it on the

first go round.

In any case, she came with the paramedics who were very worried, she was not breathing well. And the paradox of this drug is

that you’ll have periods where you are in a deep coma and not

breathing, and then the thing, you know, fighting and combative,

very difficult to manage these kids. They were very upset because

they couldn’t get her respirator and they were forced to inflict pain

to keep her breathing.

One thing we do in the ER is a sternal rub. We rub our knuckles

against the breast bone to stimulate pain and keep someone

breathing who’s not otherwise breathing, and this is what it took.

The paramedics were very upset. I said the fact that she’s alive to

worry about those bruises is good enough.

We quickly put a respirator in, which is a very unusual event for

someone under 20 years of age outside of the usual that I see car

accidents and whatnot. I am seldom having to put a young person

on a respirator, but we did that. I thought you can kind of feel the

whole room relax once that problem is addressed. And I left the

room to go talk to my staff and try to find parents. They called and

said her heart rate is 30. Again, not a common problem for a very

young person like this. I had to administer a life saving drug called

atropine and put a pacemaker on her.

I do not do this for people under 50 years of age. Very unusual.

I’m telling you how dangerous this drug is. I left the room a third

time and they called and said her body temperature’s falling.

This drug attacks every vital function, you can’t maintain heart

rate, breathing or body temperature. We’ve seen seizures with it,

39

and if truth be told, it looks like a brain hemorrhage. In fact the

first case that we saw at LDS Hospital with this myriad of—by the

way, in California, in New York we think we’re dealing with brain

hemorrhage. The first night we saw one back 2 years ago we called

a neurosurgeon, called the operating room and thought we were

going with an acute neurosurgical problem, brain hemorrhage. And

it was this drug.

They also tend to urinate on themselves, we have to put a catheter, they can’t control bladder function. They begin to vomit violently. We have to put a tube through the nose to drain the stomach. This starts off often for young people as a good time, turns out

to be anything but, and they require absolute life support for just

a short period of time, others continue.

The dramatic thing about this drug, I will tell you, I was impressed last week when I saw—it was the same as the first time

I saw it 2 years ago. All of a sudden they wake, they’re totally

awake as if the anesthetic has been turned off and they have no

memory of anything that’s transpired. So it’s very, very dramatic,

but this problem is different from what we’ve seen before.

These are not seasoned drug users. The kids are misinformed,

and I often—also have to tell you this, in the midst of resuscitation

her boyfriend came running in and said, why are you doing that,

you don’t need to do that, you doctors always do too much, she’s

not flat line. And I turned to him and said, if we waited until she

was flat line she would be dead, and we had to usher him out of

the room.

But there’s actually on the internet and on the street misinformation saying that these drugs are safe, take them, have a good

time, they were once in health foods, go for it, have a good time.

And the kids are just responding more to that than the realities of

the drug.

And I can say this drug is fast. Fifteen minutes to affecting respiration, heart rate, blood pressure, basic body functions. And I’ve

had near misses, I’m very worried before the summer’s out I’m

going to have to go to what we call in the ER ‘‘the cry room’’ and

break the worst possible news to family members. So far I’m going

to the cry room and I’m saying your son or daughter’s overdosed

and they’re on a respirator and we think everything is going to be

OK. I’m worried I’ll be going to the cry room before summer’s over

and have to tell some parents that their child, because of a mistake

they’ve made, is now dead from this drug.

Chairman HATCH. That’s pretty dramatic. Was there anything

else done to her, because often times these are date rape drugs and

they’re used by viscous people to commit rape.

Dr. WELCH. Actually luckily for her there was not. But that same

night we had a 14-year-old that we also suspected was GHB, not

as severe medical problems. But when we found her on the floor

at a party, which a group of teenagers left as soon as the life squad

arrived, her clothes had been almost completely removed. We were

very worried for her and she was only 14 years old. It’s definitely

being used in another sinister scenario.

Chairman HATCH. Well, your testimony is very important to us.

40

STATEMENT OF COLLEEN TAYLOR

Ms. Taylor, I appreciate you being here.

Ms. TAYLOR. I was truly appalled as I heard some of the testimony and I spoke earlier with Mrs. Bigelow, she mentioned something that kind of hit me difficult too. She said that some of—as

her daughter started into that whole episode, at the very first when

she was in eighth grade she was saying they’re having a dance,

they’re letting us in for half price if we wear our CTR rings.

Unfortunately to our predominant culture, that would be almost

an OK to let your kids go to that party. And my understanding

from her and so on, is that these rave clubs are truly preying on

our young people. I think it’s important, I hope today—actually a

detective I spoke with just the other day actually showed me as a

parent, a beaded necklace, a baby pacifier, things that would be— a tube of chapstick—stuff that would be around a home that parents should know that this is common paraphernalia for these kids

who are using.

I haven’t seen that yet and those are the kind of things we really

need to let parents be aware of, watching for those signs. And I

hope the media after your presentation and so on, will really pick

up and make a media blitz about this. I do feel like we do not tell

parents enough. They will act better and do better for their children if they are given more information, but we can’t work separate from parents.

PTA stands for a lot of things, but it stands for prevention. So

the more information for parents, for communities, is better not,

you know, not on the other end as they mentioned at the very end

of what has happened. Tim Condon, the Associate Director of

NIDA, mentioned that accurate, credible information is the most

powerful weapon to combat with the increasing use of these dangerous drugs.

Hopefully the PTA will be able to open up further dialogue as we

provide training and information to our parents, and as I spoke at

the very first, the PTA is here to encourage parents to find out

where their kids are going, who their friends are. Open communication with their kids. Also to be very up front about telling your

kids not to ingest anything that would have—the first sign was

these girls laughing, and it’s difficult to believe that friends would,

you know, play a joke on a good friend. So not just strangers that

they need to be aware of, but friends too. Because of the negative

information we’ve had about these drugs, that they are feel good

drugs, they’ll be OK.

Unfortunately some of our young people think it’s OK to pop a

pill because parents pop pills all the time. Not necessarily bad

drugs, but we’re a pill using society. It’s not shooting up or using,

you know, some of the other paraphernalia that’s been used in the

past.

One more thing that we really need to concentrate on is really

listen to our teens. Often we’re quick to jump in and say, let me

tell you how you handle that. Start listening better to our teens,

find out what’s going on in their lives, why they’re upset about

things, before it gets too far.

Real important skills that I push with the DARE program just

a little bit, I’ve got six kids, the youngest is almost 14. The DARE

41

program gave them good skills, good conflict management skills,

good peer pressure training that if we don’t have someone provide

for our children from kindergarten up, I’m not sure who else will.

Parents help a lot too, they need to reinforce those things taught

by the DARE program, but that’s a critical program that I think

does help a lot in the schools. Those are those kind of life-styles

that we truly as a community need to focus more on.

Just a couple of other things, is we need to make sure that our

kids know we care about them. We need to know where they’re

going, who they’re hanging out with. We do want them to kiss us

good night so we can smell their breath, know who they’ve been

hanging out with, those kind of things. Don’t be afraid to be a parent. That’s been part of the concern too, we’ve stepped away, we

want independent kids. But they need parameters, they need that

guidance from us.

Be alert to signs of trouble, and as a PTA, really step up our efforts to really give more information to our parents. We work with

a lot of the different associations that you’ve mentioned in giving

training to our parents so they’re truly aware of what they should

be looking for for their young people to help protect them.

Appreciate you being here and all the efforts that you are making.

Chairman HATCH. We appreciate you and your testimony.

Mr. Allred, we’ll turn to you.

STATEMENT OF STEVE ALLRED

Mr. ALLRED. I’d also like to thank you, Senator Hatch, for inviting me. I’d also like to make you the offer of using my experience

and my knowledge at any time in the future.

Chairman HATCH. Thank you.

Mr. ALLRED. As the Substance Abuse Prevention and Treatment

Program manager for Utah County Division of Human Services I

have recognized that the club drug problem is increasing in our

community. The availability of GHB and MDMA or Ecstasy, methamphetamine and LSD has grown and our youth are finding it very

easy to obtain. These specific drugs are popular in the rave scene

due to the effects which keep one awake and alert allowing an individual to party longer and consume other drugs like alcohol and

marijuana.

Youth in our community have done their homework on the different drugs of abuse and are very sophisticated in knowing about

drug effects and the effects of combined drugs. They know that

when they take GHB they can experience a euphoric feeling without having to consume alcohol which can be smelled on the breath

and tested for with a breathalyzer. They are very aware that these

drugs are hard to detect through our current testing—hard to detect through our current testing methods.

Those involved in the drug culture have networked and have

amazing communication systems in place. When youth are referred

to our office for a substance abuse assessment they are very informed in what they should and shouldn’t admit to. They have

been informed by peers that the admission of certain use patterns

or chemicals will meet the criteria for a treatment placement.

Those who are referred to treatment are informed about drug testVerDate 11-MAY-2000 02:04 Sep 13, 2001 Jkt 073821 PO 00000 Frm 00045 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\C821.XXX pfrm03 PsN: C821
42

ing procedures and know that marijuana can be detected in a urine

sample for up to 30 days. Knowing this they modify their use of

drugs and take drug testing masking products or fluid load to increase the likelihood of a negative drug screen. Current drug testing procedures don’t screen for GHB or MDMA.

In a recent conversation with an attorney from the Utah State

Attorney General’s office he stated that we are having to constantly

create new laws to keep up with the illegal manufacturing of drugs.

Chemists find it very profitable to create drugs with a slightly altered molecular structure to avoid controlled substance laws. Once

a drug is designated as a controlled substance, the chemist will

alter the chemical structure slightly and we will begin the controlled substance process all over again. There are also several

sources of information as to the manufacturing of these chemicals

on the Internet and through other publications. A young girl in a

group I was facilitating in the last month stated that there were

books in her high school library that gave the instructions to manufacture GHB and methamphetamine.

Date rape is another concern with these drugs. GHB, Ketamine,

and Rohypnol can have an amnesia effect, decrease inhibitions, and

an individual may have poor memory of incidents occurring while

under their influence. In this case a date rape may not be reported

due to a vagueness of memory or no memory at all. These drugs

are tasteless and odorless and can be slipped to someone unknowingly. Realistically, alcohol is also a date rape drug which lowers

inhibitions and judgment. People have been using alcohol to take

advantage of others throughout history. In combination with GHB,

Ketamine, or Rohypnol, the danger is magnified.

Another concern that hasn’t gotten much publicity yet is the use

of Dextromethorphan, an ingredient in Robitussin and Coricidin,

an over-the-counter cough medicine. Young people have reported

that this common drug enhances the effect of other drugs and reduces the ‘‘hangover’’ effect of drinking. Youth are aware of Internet sites which give the reader instructions on how to and how

much an individual needs to get the desired effect.

I believe that it is clear that we have an ever growing substance

abuse problem in our communities and that there are constant

changes and new discoveries each day. It is almost impossible to

keep up with these problems and we need to change the approach

to dealing with substance abuse in our country. We have waged a

war on drugs which is an interdiction approach to reduce the supply of illegal drugs. I need to make it very clear that I am not an

advocate of legalizing drugs, but believe there needs to be a strong

shift in the way we view and deal with this serious problem. Research outcomes during the Nixon administration showed that drug

treatment at the local level is actually the most effective way to

wage this war.

The war on drugs began with a focus on cocaine and marijuana.

We have not had a decrease in marijuana use in Utah but have

had a significant increase. While the war on drugs focussed on

marijuana, we had a decrease among youth in Utah—from the

Bahr surveys. From 1989 to 1997—excuse me—there was a slight

decrease originally from 1989 to 1997. Marijuana has increased

from 6 to 10 percent amongst our youth. Cocaine has shown a sigVerDate 11-MAY-2000 02:04 Sep 13, 2001 Jkt 073821 PO 00000 Frm 00046 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\C821.XXX pfrm03 PsN: C821
43

nificant decrease as law enforcement efforts reduce the supply and

increase the price. My observation as a substance abuse professional is that cocaine use decreased but the use of other drugs increased in their place. We as a society need to—tend to sensationalize current issues and limit our focus to ‘‘big news’’ issues and

ignoring other consistent problems. Meth use and the busting of

meth labs is big news and we are enacting stronger efforts in prevention, treatment and law enforcement to deal with this issue.

Are we neglecting to focus on other drugs again?

It is obvious that when we focus on supply rather than demand

we will always get the supply. No matter how many drug dealers

you put in jail there’s someone willing to take their place. I believe

that when we make prevention and treatment a priority, not only

in thought but also in funding, we will greatly increase our chances

of winning the war on drugs.

According to local and Federal surveys, Utah has the lowest rate

of drug use prevalence in the country, Utah County being the lowest in the State. The numbers indicate that 9.8 percent of the

youth in Utah County reported using an illegal substance in the 30

days prior to taking the survey, or abuse among Utah students in

1997, but when you break the percentage into actual youth, it adds

up to 3,494 students. It appears that we are doing an effective job

of prevention and treatment in our communities based on issues

from 3 years ago. With the added problems of new drugs surfacing

we are slowly slipping behind, which indicates the need of an increase of funding for these new issues. It is difficult to keep up

with or even get ahead of substance abuse problems, and with new

technology it is becoming increasingly more difficult. We are currently running awareness programs in our schools and community

to help educate citizens on current issues, but need to reach a larger portion of our population.

Our risk and protective factors for Utah County indicate that we

have a strong religious community, which contributes to our low

rate of substance abuse incidents. On the other hand, our risk factors indicate the need for developing a stronger attachment to the

community, healthy family and parenting programs, and stronger

rewards for positive behaviors. We facilitate these problems as best

we can but we need greater resources, including funding, to continue to aid our youth in reducing substance abuse and other destructive behaviors.

Thank you.

STATEMENT OF ANONYMOUS PERSON

Chairman HATCH. Thank you.

I’m going to just ask some questions, hopefully our mic system

will work, ask some questions to our teenager who has had some

experience with these matters, and then we can cover it this way

and then I have some questions for your panelists.

Now, let me ask you this question: This is an anonymous teenager, but someone who has experience in this area. In your experience just how prevalent are drugs such as methamphetamine, Ecstasy and GHB at our local clubs, is the situation worse at rave

events?

44

ANONYMOUS PERSON. Well, Senator, my experience is that these

drugs are everywhere. They’re very prevalent in the clubs and

they’re easier to find in the rave events because there’s no alcohol

so there’s a shift in focus just to drugs.

Chairman HATCH. Would it be accurate to say drugs are available to anyone any time at these venues?

ANONYMOUS PERSON. Yes. Often times dealers walk around just

telling kids, I have E, I have X, just saying that. They’re a real

comfortable environment, they either know the promoter or the security guards or they are in fact the promoter or security guards

themselves.

Chairman HATCH. You’re saying security guards at the clubs and

the rave parties that are looking for patrons who might be carrying

these drugs, but you’re saying some may be complicit?

ANONYMOUS PERSON. Exactly, synonymous. What better would it

be than just throw a party just to sell your drugs. That’s what

these raves are basically for.

Chairman HATCH. But you’ve heard the head of the PTA here

today, some parties seem to give a discount for those who wear

CTR rings.

ANONYMOUS PERSON. Yeah, I mean—— Chairman HATCH. Are you familiar with that?

ANONYMOUS PERSON. No, I’m not. But I can see that that would

be a good marketing move, because in our culture, I mean, in Utah

there is a large LDS factor, and those people don’t believe in alcohol, and so if a kid goes to a party, there’s going to be no alcohol

at, their parents are more inclined to let them go.

Chairman HATCH. So choose the right—— ANONYMOUS PERSON. Right, yeah.

Chairman HATCH [continuing]. Rings, they’re actually exploiting

that situation.

ANONYMOUS PERSON. Total exploitation.

Chairman HATCH. In general how old are the youth that you’re

seeing using these drugs?

ANONYMOUS PERSON. I would say probably starting around 16,

possibly even younger, but my experience between 16 and 18 and

on.

Chairman HATCH. Well, are these young people, are they from all

walks of life?

ANONYMOUS PERSON. They would be from all walks of life, but

more and more increasing from affluent kids, surprisingly, because

they have money. Dealers will target children in upper, middle

class to rich children because they have money. Their allowances

are greater, they can afford to buy these kind of drugs.

Chairman HATCH. In your experience how much does it cost to

buy some of these drugs?

ANONYMOUS PERSON. For Ecstasy, between $20 to $25 in Salt

Lake City. The going rate throughout the country is basically $20

per pill.

Chairman HATCH. How about GHB?

ANONYMOUS PERSON. If you were to buy pills in greater amounts,

you know, five to ten pills, you will get a price break. That’s what

happens. So GHB—I’m not sure how it’s sold, probably bottled,

most likely at raves. Most people purchase that before they’re

45

going, they’ll just have that on hand in like a large bottle in their

house and just put a smaller container for travelling.

Chairman HATCH. Have you ever had any experience with GHB?

ANONYMOUS PERSON. Absolutely. I’ve tried all these drugs personally myself. I would find GHB probably the most dangerous, it’s

so hard to regulate. You have one cap, it’s poured into an Avian

bottle, you pour a cap in or you drink it by itself or put it into juice

to cover up the taste, which is extremely——

Chairman HATCH. You sound extremely intelligent.

ANONYMOUS PERSON. I’m not—I’m a little bit older than you had

thought. I’m 25 years old so I’ve been around. I’ve worked in the

club scene for 5 years as a bouncer, promoter and operations manager in other States, and have been here recently, in California and

in New York. So I’ve had a pretty good reference point of what’s

going on, and I see Utah and we have a really interesting opportunity here where it’s kind of just hitting now in the last half year

to a year, the rave scene has really excelled here, started to take

off. And if we were all to become informed and combat this intelligently, it would definitely—we’d be able to get rid of it or control

it before it’s out of control. Los Angeles is out of control. Ecstasy

is everywhere. People don’t even drink, there are clubs now that

don’t even sell beer.

Chairman HATCH. Is that right?

ANONYMOUS PERSON. Yeah.

Chairman HATCH. How long ago did you start using these drugs?

ANONYMOUS PERSON. Probably 4 years ago, sir, due to my involvement in the night club scene, just going out and you start just

becoming desensitized to the fact that, you know, drugs are used.

Chairman HATCH. How does it effect you today, are you using

them still?

ANONYMOUS PERSON. Sir, I’m not using them today, very happy

that I can attest. And I was deeply moved by the mother who was

speaking about amphetamine addiction, and I wrote several

rebuttals to different things I’ve heard and different ways that

have effected my life. And I really believe there’s no rehabilitation

for amphetamine, it’s habituation can be curbed, but the addiction

will never be cured. And so that’s scary. We need to reach these

children before they’re actually addicted, and that’s to the DARE

program. I feel that we need—just saying no is not enough. Why

should I say no? I mean, we need to respect one another by offering

explanations and reasonings for abstinence from drug use. Our

kids are small, you know, back in the 1950’s possibly kids would

just obey their parents. But it’s a difficult culture, it’s a negative

thing, but it’s never too late. We need to inform our children what

these drugs specifically do. They need to know if they take GHB

this, this and this will happen. They need to know bout Special K,

that it is not just—it’s—Special K is just a word for Ketamine.

That’s a cat tranquilizer that’s used by vets on a cat, you know.

Chairman HATCH. Tell me what caused you to change.

ANONYMOUS PERSON. I just found my life deteriorating. Methamphetamine is so addicting and the feeling of euphoria brought

about by that drug and GHB is—it’s fun, basically, it is just fun

and it feels good at first. But as you delve into the use and use

46

more and more, the fun fades away and you just keep going after

this feeling, this euphoric feeling, this up, talkative feeling.

And that’s what these partiers are doing, going to clubs and

using these drugs and they’re taking nine to ten pallets sometimes,

but you know, that’s very, very dangerous with MDMA and Ecstasy. Each tablet is 100 to 150 milligrams of MDMA. MDMA is

fatal at 1,000 milligrams. If you’re taking nine to ten you’re risking

your life and not even knowing it, because these pills, like the gentleman said, they’re packaged in such a way to make them look

like candy, they’re colored pink, green, whatever. They’re pressed

with Nike swishes.

Chairman HATCH. In your opinion do these young people know

the danger they face from these drugs? What are some of the—if

they do, what is some of the—what are some of the risky behaviors

that you’ve observed?

ANONYMOUS PERSON. Basically the most risky in my opinion is

GHB and just the uses involved with that. Let me just breakdown

the scenario, how it all works. I think if we have a working knowledge of these drugs then we can understand them and then in turn

through understanding, law enforcement can combat them. So can

parents. Parents need to understand.

GHB, you take and picture an Avian bottle, a clear solution, saline solution of GHB. You pour out a cap full and you mix it with

a liquid or just shoot it, just like a shot, throw it back. To start,

then they use more. Take two grams as initial dose, you drink that,

then maybe in half hour, 45 minutes you think about taking more.

But as a club goer, a person used to drinking alcohol, they drink

consistently, drink more and more drinks, so a user of GHB will

continue to want to drink more and more, their habituation, you

know.

Chairman HATCH. How do the parents know what a club is, I

mean, tell—— ANONYMOUS PERSON. Pardon me?

Chairman HATCH. Where are these clubs, how do you know what

the club is?

ANONYMOUS PERSON. A night club?

Chairman HATCH. Yeah.

ANONYMOUS PERSON. Most of them are found in downtown Salt

Lake. The two biggest would be Briggs and Axis, those two are

both clubs. Those two clubs both have an 18 and up area where underage children can come and party until, you know, the wee hours

of the evening. And the 18 is not something that parents can really

feel safe about. If your child is under 18 they’ll still get in. If you

say you forget your ID and you look like you’re over 12, the bouncer will let you in. Very possible. It happens every night. I see it

at work.

Chairman HATCH. Where do the rave parties occur?

ANONYMOUS PERSON. Rave parties will be held probably in more

remote local due to their legality. If you don’t have a permit your

party can be busted, and the promoter makes more money by the

party lasting longer, several days. There was just one last holiday

weekend that went 2 days in Ogden Canyon, you know.

Chairman HATCH. There was a rave party in Ogden Canyon for

2 days?

47

ANONYMOUS PERSON. Yes, sir, because of the Fourth of July holiday.

Chairman HATCH. You’ve been very helpful, I’m telling you——

ANONYMOUS PERSON. Thank you. I just wanted to thank you for

this opportunity to share my knowledge about the night club scene

and that culture infatuated with drug use.

Chairman HATCH. Do these kids know that they’re likely to be

using this stuff?

ANONYMOUS PERSON. I think that the whole thing is just kind of

in culturation as kids, you know, they turn 18, they start going to

night clubs, maybe their friends go. They turn 21 and they go to

the bar area, start drinking. As soon as they start drinking they

realize people are doing other things, there’s something else out

there besides alcohol. They might try the drug. Drugs are fun, sir,

initially. Amphetamine speeds up—it speeds up everything, just

makes it more fun, initially, and that’s where addiction comes.

Chairman HATCH. Thank you. I appreciate it, you’ve added a lot

to this hearing today.

ANONYMOUS PERSON. You’re very welcome.

Chairman HATCH. I’ve been told Patrick Flemming sent us advice that the average treatment time needed is 18 months. The cost

is $8,000 for rehabilitation, and after care treatment is extremely

necessary in these areas with regard to methamphetamine. And interesting to note that the number one meth users are women ages

18 to 25, according to this resource.

Dr. Welch, is that consistent with what you believe?

Dr. WELCH. Yes. Sometimes I think they’ll start out for other

reasons, I’ve seen young girls do it to keep their weight down, start

using crystal meth and fall into it more and more heavily.

Chairman HATCH. I understand in recent months you’ve put a

half a dozen people under the age of 20 on respirators to prevent

death by GHB overdose. Could you please explain why people who

take GHB can respond so differently to slight differences in

strength of doses, and in your answer please tell us what the

phrase ‘‘narrow therapeutic range’’ means and why young people

experimenting with GHB should understand that phrase.

ANONYMOUS PERSON. Narrow therapeutic range will use that

medicine we’re talking about, a drug that the amount needed to go

from the desired effect to a toxic effect is very, very small, and

that’s exactly the case with GHB. A half a teaspoon, you’re dancing, euphoric, having a good time. A whole teaspoon and you’re not

breathing. That drug is comparable to like coumadin, which is a

blood thinner. If you have any elderly family members on these

drugs you know that they go to the doctor regularly for drug testing and drug levels to make sure we don’t get them toxic. If this

was a prescribed drug we would be following it very, very closely

because it’s that dangerous.

Chairman HATCH. I see. Now also just so we understand, these

young kids you have differing physical anatomies, and what may

be safe for one young person may not be safe for another. Am I getting that right?

Dr. WELCH. That’s exactly right.

Chairman HATCH. So you can’t be sure?

48

Dr. WELCH. It’s not pure. Take a little bottle—I’ve actually seen

kids carrying small mouthwash and small shampoo bottles with

the liquid in it, they take a swig. One person’s swig is not the same

as another’s, and very different effects based on body weight.

Chairman HATCH. What may be somewhat safe for one person

may be life threatening to another.

Dr. WELCH. Right. And don’t forget——

Chairman HATCH. You didn’t tell——

Dr. WELCH [continuing]. They’re often mixing it with a smorgasbord. We know nationwide 40 percent of the time alcohol is coingested. Another 25 percent of the time other harder drugs like

amphetamine and cocaine are also ingested. All of these things

strengthen GHB. Every single one down the line strengthens the

potency of GHB, and so although you should wake up from an overdose, even the worst overdose, we have to put a respirator on. Statistics are being quoted roughly 5 hours you should be awake. We

have one young girl that intubated in the ER at LDS and stayed

on the respirator for 13 hours because she co-ingested other things.

Chairman HATCH. Is it true there’s no antedote for GHB?

Dr. WELCH. That’s the other big problem with it. As you may

know we have antidote for heroin overdose, I have something to

treat you. If you take a sedative overdose, I have an antidote to

treat you. GHB there is none.

Chairman HATCH. Let me turn now to Ms. Taylor. I know we’ve

run out of time, but this is a particularly important panel as well,

and to your knowledge has an increase in rave parties accompanying club drugs, have they had an impact on student performances in school?

Ms. TAYLOR. You know, that’s difficult for us to figure out for

sure. As we start putting some of this information together today

the schools had already let out for the summer, but back to those

folks who work with drug prevention and so on, not many parents

know kids participate in some of these drugs. Parents don’t call up

and say my kid was on GHB last night, he’s not coming to school.

But I think more awareness if parents could understand, you

know, some side effects and so on, he’s got the flu or something,

he’s been on GHB, I think that’s part of that awareness in that information that we have to get out to parents so that they will know

the differences and so on. We don’t, you know, so involved we

can’t——

Chairman HATCH. Mrs. Bigelow describes——

Ms. TAYLOR. Very well.

Chairman HATCH [continuing]. Methamphetamine pretty well.

Ms. TAYLOR. I thought she did too.

Chairman HATCH. Let me go to Mr. Allred, and you might think

about this as well, Ms. Taylor, and of course Dr. Welch. Do you

think increasing the awareness of club drugs might entice more

young people to use them or try them, or are the dangers so great

and the problem so vast that this is not an issue?

Mr. ALLRED. I believe the danger is so great that that’s not an

issue.

Chairman HATCH. It’s good to inform people about these things,

get them so they realize?

49

Mr. ALLRED. I believe in education we need to inform the kids

of the consequences of these chemicals, what can happen to them,

so forth and so on. One of the things that really bothers me as a

prevention person are substance abuse people saying, well, if you

tell my kid about meth they’ll go out and try it, I believe kids going

from just hearing about it there’s already something in place that’s

wrong, and we need to look at that at an earlier stage.

Chairman HATCH. You mentioned in your written testimony

those drug networks have amazing communication systems in

place. Could you give us just a little more detail on the nature of

this network and networking on our school grounds, to your knowledge?

Mr. ALLRED. Absolutely. That’s where the kids meet, that’s

where they’re all together.

Chairman HATCH. Tell us what the teachers and parents should

be aware of.

Mr. ALLRED. Yes. If they’re organizing a rave, like the young

man talked about, they network and all of the kids know when and

where it is. We don’t. So that’s an example of their networking.

I sent a couple examples of web pages to your staff that was giving instructions on how to take Coricidin. The young man describing it started out by taking four milligrams at first. If that doesn’t

get you where you want to go, then try four more, and then increase it by doses of four until you get what you want. And he said,

I’ve taken up to 16 at a time and that’s a perfect high for me. And

that’s over the Internet.

So they’re networking through several methods. I think technology has its pluses and its minuses, and this is one of the down

sides of technology, is it’s given the kids a tool to network and pass

on information that’s not healthy for them.

Chairman HATCH. You know, as somebody who has authored the

Hatch Drug Prohibition Act I’ve worked with biochemical companies, I’ve worked with pharmaceutical companies, I’ve worked with

the—really that legislation created the generic drug industry, the

modern generic drug industry in the country. I’ve spent a lot of

time on all of those issues. People don’t realize that even with truly

improved pharmaceuticals there are dangers. Imagine what it’s like

to be experiencing with these type of drugs we’ve been discussing

here today.

Chairman HATCH. Also you’re talking dosages, if you’re getting

a chemical that’s homemade the dosage is inconsistent, you don’t

know how strong the GHB you’re taking is. Depends how somebody

made it, whether I made it using a good recipe or a bad recipe.

Chairman HATCH. This is an actual lab, methamphetamine lab.

Look how filthy it is, and as we mentioned, it’s an absolute bomb

ready to go off, it’s toxic, it’s environmentally destructive, it’s carcinogenic. Kids don’t know that and yet in 15 minutes over the net

you can learn how to do it.

Mr. ALLRED. The small children we were talking about are testing positive for methamphetamine. That’s just breathing it in from

the air. They’re not actually taking the drug, they’re just exposed

to it.

50

Chairman HATCH. Let me ask our anonymous witness just one

more question. He left? OK. I guess we won’t get any more advice

from him.

That was pretty astounding when you stop to think. He indicated

he had taken meth and how it feels, but he said it’s never going

to leave, the desire for it, is that your experience?

Mr. ALLRED. Absolutely. We’ve determined that addiction is a

disease and it’s a chronic disease. You have it until death. We can

arrest it through treatments and we’re quite successful at that now

days if it’s a good treatment program.

I didn’t want to bring this up but I’m going to. The DARE situation came up and with Mayor Anderson’s comments in the Deseret

News talked about the Salt Lake City Police Department had four

DARE officers and the budget’s $270,000 a year for them. My entire youth treatment budget is less than that for Utah County. I

have an issue with that. I need funds.

Chairman HATCH. We’ve got to change that. We’ve got to get

more help to you, it’s just that simple. The methamphetamine bill

that I’ve got through the Senate unanimously hasn’t gone through

the House yet, has more money in it, so does the Juvenile Justice

Bill, it had a billion dollars in it for rehabilitation, and you know,

for treatments. So we—what we’ve got to do is get some of these

things through. And I have to say that the original Juvenile Justice

Bill, this has very little to do about guns, it really would have

made a difference, but they’ve succeeded in making it a gun bill.

Next thing you know we can’t get anything passed, can’t get either

side together to get it done.

Mr. ALLRED. If I may add one more comment, Senator, I’ve heard

Mr. McCaufrey speak on several occasions, he’s made the very

scary statement that they are going to make the funds available to

the communities that show the greatest need. Now, I’ve talked

about Utah has the lowest rate of incidents in the country, Utah

County the lowest in the State. If he follows through with that plan

he is going to punish us for doing a good job and we’re going to

lose prevention dollars in Utah because we can’t prove the need.

Chairman HATCH. Of course we need to do it where the major

problems are, but I think we can’t ignore problems anywhere.

Doctor, I want to thank you, all three of you, but I particularly

wanted to thank you for your cogent scientific explanation here,

they’ve been very important to us and you’re right on the spot

working with these kids and working with these problems.

I just hope that the media in this State, they don’t have to mention this hearing, I hope they’ll get these ideas that you folks have

been telling us about out there so parents will start to realize that,

you know, the fast paced modern world we’ve got open to influence

and so much opportunity to do wrong that they got to be watching

out for their kids, just that simple. And then of course there are

a lot of kids who don’t have both parents which adds to the problem, and there are a lot of parents who aren’t doing what they

should as parents.

So let me just end with this: I want to express my appreciation

to our witnesses for taking the time to be here and share their insights with us today. I certainly learned a lot and I hope everyone

who was able to come today did as well.

51

I think clearly when we think about the things that could adversely effect our young people’s health as well as their ability to

learn and to make good choices, drug abuse and the health and

learning problems that go with it rank pretty darn high on the list.

We have already seen the tragic ramifications of gang activity,

cocaine, crack, and other drugs. According to the experts we’ve

heard today, we can now add these so-called club drugs to the

growing list of threats to our children, to our kids.

And we will leave the record open until July 21 for any additional questions from members of the Judiciary Committee or for

additional statements from Utah’s elected officials, educational,

medical, or law enforcement communities. And I would like to invite all of you to submit short statements as well, any who desire

to. I also hope to include a limited number in the hearing record.

Since such statements may contribute a constructive suggestion for

action, a personal experience, or additional facts concerning the

perils facing Utah’s youth.

I believe that continuing dialogue on these issues is essential if

we are to develop strong alliances in the battle for our children’s

futures. Establishing this dialogue is one of the principal reasons

for holding this committee hearing today. And when it comes to

drug abuse, all of us, in every level of government, education, public health, law enforcement, and in the community at large, have

key roles to play.

Yet, this is not a problem that can be or will be solved overnight.

It’s certainly not a problem the Federal Government can solve by

itself or with the one-size-fits-all approach. I don’t think the Federal Government should even try to do that. I believe that the people who know best and care most about our young people are right

here in Utah, and with all due respect, no bureaucrat at HHS or

agent at the DEA is going to care as much as we do about the future of our own sons and daughters, although they do care.

I intend to do my part and look forward to working with my fellow Utahns on effective ways not only to put the dealers and pushers out of business, but also to help make sure that our young people are aware of the dangers of using these drugs.

And again, I’d like to thank you, everyone who attended this

hearing, for being here. I welcome all of your insights and suggestions for ways we can work together to win this battle.

Now for the record, I’m submitting the testimony prepared by

Steve Branch of the Immigration and Nationalization Service, a

videotape on methamphetamine created by the Health and Sanity

Partnership. This videotape is entitled, Your Kid May Have a Secret, is available from Alta View Hospital in Sandy.

Now, if people want to stay for a few minutes, I believe some of

the DEA agents have agreed to explain how the meth lab here set

up to my right operates, and so with that I would like to thank you

all for being here and attending today’s hearing. I think it’s been

a very good hearing, I hope you’ve all learned a lot. I hope you will

get this videotape, a lot of you may want to get a hold of and watch

this, this really is a very good thing.

Thank you for being here, we appreciate it. With that we’ll recess

until further notice.

[Whereupon, at 3:40 p.m., the committee adjourned.]

(53)

EMERGING DRUG THREATS AND PERILS

FACING UTAH’S YOUTH

FRIDAY, JULY 7, 2000

U.S. SENATE,

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY,

Cedar City, UT.

The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:00 p.m., at Southern

Utah Univerty, 351 West Center, Cedar City, UT, Hon. Orrin G.

Hatch (chairman of the committee) presiding.

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. ORRIN G. HATCH, A U.S.

SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF UTAH

Chairman HATCH. If we could have you all come to attention, I’m

going to move this up a little closer.

We’ll begin our hearing today. This is an important hearing, so

I’m going to say good afternoon and welcome to this hearing of the

Senate full Judiciary Committee. I’m holding these hearings both

here and in Salt Lake to examine the existing and emerging

threats posed by illicit drugs to Utah’s young people. Our rural

youth have not escaped the effects of such perils, and that is why

I especially wanted to hold this meeting here in Cedar City.

And I’m pleased to see so many people here who are committed,

as am I, to focusing attention, as well as educational and law enforcement resources on combatting this problem.

The goal of today’s hearing is to begin a public dialogue on how

we can work together to combat the too-little-known dangers of a

growing substance abuse problem in our community.

Some Utahns have heard of methamphetamine. We know that

meth is a horrible drug and that the labs where it is manufactured

are producing tremendous toxic chemicals that pose risks to whole

neighborhoods. Meth’s association with criminal gangs is also well

known. The cycle of drug abuse and gang violence is readily apparent to our fellow Utahns. To deal with our gang problem, we must

also deal with our drug problem.

Fewer, however, are aware meth is just one of the so called, ‘‘club

drugs,’’ that are beginning to attract a whole new group of young

people in Utah. These drugs known as club drugs include methamphetamine, Ecstasy, GHB, and Rohipnol, and are often used at

parties or nightclubs.

The symptoms of this club drug use are showing up everywhere.

Utah’s emergency rooms, police departments, schools, and rape crisis centers have experienced increases in reported cases and the

tragic consequences of drug club use or club drug use.

54

Utah’s Rape Recovery Center, for example, has received reports

of 40 rapes so far this year that are specified—or, excuse me, that

are suspected to involve the club drug called GHB. That figure represents 35 percent of rapes reported to the center this year. Meanwhile, last year 7.3 percent of Utah high school students reported

having used methamphetamine at least once, and, according to the

Drug Enforcement Agency—the DEA—law enforcement authorities

seized 266 meth labs in Utah in 1999.

A special danger inherent in these drugs is the fact that many

users of club drugs would not consider taking cocaine, LSD, heroin,

or marijuana drugs that are perceived by them to be more dangerous, although the opposite is the case. But because of misinformation about the risks, these young people knowingly ingest

such substances as GHB, the so called date rape drug, and are experiencing the problems associated with illicit drugs abuse, including overdose addiction, amnesia, sexual assault, and permanent

brain damage.

The lack of public awareness about club drugs is luring a whole

new population of Utah’s young people into the horrible consequences of illicit drug use. For instance, we found that in one

case they were allowing kids with CTR rings on to get into the club

at half price. And these kids thought because there was no liquor

served on the premises that this was going to be a nice family type

of thing.

Now, methamphetamine is a powerfully addictive stimulant that

produces increased wakefulness, increased physical activity, decreased appetite, increased respiration, hyperthermia, and euphoria. It can cause convulsions and can result in death.

Ecstasy is a synthetic mind-altering drug with amphetamine-like

and hallucinogenic properties. Ecstasy has no accepted medical use,

and it causes health problems similar to those caused by the use

of amphetamines and cocaine. Psychological difficulties including

confusion, depression, sleep problems, drug cravings, severe anxiety, and paranoia. These effects may continue weeks later. Ecstasy

users have also died from acute dehydration.

GHB and Rohipnol are predominantly central nervous system depressants. Because they are common colorless, tasteless, and odorless, they can be easily added to beverages and ingested unknowingly, causing sedation, often rendering the victims, usually a

young woman, helpless. They have become notorious for their use

in crimes, particularly rape, because these drugs produce amnesia,

making it very difficult to arrest and convict any perpetrator.

The novelty, and that means in some cases petty rapists, in these

drugs is undoubtedly one reason for the recent surge in their use.

Because these drugs are relatively new, young people may not perceive that taking them is unsafe; rather, they believe that their reported adverse effects are rare or exaggerated, and that such reactions could never affect them personally.

As is so often the case, when a newer drug arrives on the scene,

young people hear much more about its so-called benefits than

about its potential harms. Young people are attracted to the seemingly increased stamina and intoxicating highs these drugs purport

to offer. As Utahns, we all need to understand that using these

55

drugs can have serious, and potentially deadly, consequences. So

we need to work on solving these problems.

Over the last several years we have worked hard to obtain more

resources for local law enforcement in Utah. The formation of the

Rocky Mountain HIDTA, that’s called High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, for example, has brought additional DEA resources to

Utah to stop trafficking and to close down these labs. Just this

week a new DEA office in Utah was opened.

Additionally, Congress enacted the Methamphetamine Control

Act, which I sponsored, to toughen meth penalties and place greater restrictions on the chemicals from which meth is created and

made. This important law has allowed the DEA and other law enforcement entities to stop large quantities of precursor chemicals

from being purchased in the United States for the use in manufacturing methamphetamine in Utah and elsewhere.

In our further effort to combat meth, we have also passed the

Methamphetamine Trafficking Penalty Enforcement Act and my

other bill, the Methamphetamine Anti-Proliferation Act of 1999.

The latter bill, which passed the Senate unanimously last November, in addition to helping local law enforcement, contains several

significant prevention and treatment provisions. We simply cannot

just punish our way out of this problem.

And, finally, we have enacted the Hillory J. Farias and

Samantha Reid Date-Rape Drug Prohibition Act of 2000. This law,

named for two victims of date rape, officially recognizes the harm

caused by GHB and designates it specifically as a controlled substance.

We have also worked to bring more Federal prosecutors and INS

officers to Utah to facilitate action against those who are corrupting and endangering our youth.

It is important that we all work together to respond to this new

peril confronting our young people. The Federal Government can

support State and local efforts, but it cannot be a substitute to

those loving and dedicated parents, teachers, coaches, physicians,

counselors, religious leaders, and police officers who serve daily on

the front lines in the war against these life-threatening and liferuining dangers facing our children and our grandchildren.

We need to educate ourselves about these dangers, gangs, teen

pregnancy, teen suicide, drugs, and now club drugs, so that we can

better teach and guide our children and our young people. We love

them and that’s why we should do this.

And, as your Senator and Chairman of the Judiciary Committee,

I want to hear first hand from Utahns who have observed the impact from these drugs in our State. That’s why I scheduled these

hearings in Utah.

And we have two panels of distinguished witnesses to testify

about the work they are doing to reduce the threat posed by these

drugs to our young people. So I want to welcome our witnesses and

extend our appreciation to them for being here today. I look forward to their testimony.

Now, some of the leaders that we are very happy to have in our

audience are Representative Steve Bennion, the president of the

university here and an old time friend and wonderful leader. And

56

State Representative Bob Owen. Bob, where are you? Right there.

Great.

We’ve got Commissioner Lewis Bowen. Commissioner Bowen.

Lois. Why am I saying Lewis? Lois Bullock. Good to have you here.

Joe Greene, district director of the INS, we are really honored to

have you here. Gary Davis of the school board. Gary, good to have

you here. Glen Halterman, the mayor of Parowan right here. There

he is right there. Patricia Sheffield of the Western County Children’s Justice Center, we’re happy to have you here as well.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Greene follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF JOSEPH R. GREENE, DISTRICT DIRECTOR, U.S.

IMMIGRATION AND NATURALIZATION SERVICE, DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE

Mr. Chairman, it is an honor and a pleasure to address you today on the subject

of the INS support of narcotics enforcement efforts in Utah. My name is Joseph R.

Greene, and I am the District Director for the Denver District Office of the Immigration and Naturalization Service. The Denver District is responsible for the states of

Colorado, Utah and Wyoming.

As you know, Mr. Chairman, the Salt Lake City Office of the INS has been deeply

engaged in addressing the problem of criminal aliens in Utah. Our office has also

consistently supported narcotics enforcement efforts in the state. For over a decade,

INS has participated in the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force

(OCDETF) in Salt Lake City. In addition, INS is a member of the Salt Lake City

Pioneer Park Drug Task Force and the Pioneer Park bicycle patrol, whose efforts

have led to a significant reduction in street-level narcotics dealing in Pioneer Park.

We also participate with other local law enforcement agencies in the Salt Lake City

Community Oriented Policing (COPS) Methanphetamine initiative.

You will recall in 1997 that you convened the Crime Summit in Salt Lake City,

which was attended by the Attorney General and the Commissioner of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, Doris Meissner. In 1998, Mark Reed, the Regional

Director for the Central Region with jurisdiction over Denver and Salt Lake City,

testified before the House Subcommittee on Immigration and Claims in Salt Lake

City regarding the ongoing efforts of the INS against criminal aliens in Utah. I am

proud to report today that our efforts have proven to be more effective since the Regional Director’s testimony.

IDENTIFICATION AND APPREHENSION OF CRIMINAL ALIENS

In fiscal year 1997, the Salt Lake City INS office apprehended a total of 810

criminal aliens. In July, 1998, Mr. Reed reported that the Salt Lake City office

would likely exceed 1,200 criminal alien apprehensions during that fiscal year. In

fact, during fiscal year 1998, this office apprehended 1,213 criminal aliens. In fiscal

year 1999, the total was 1,017. As of June, which ends the Third Quarter of fiscal

year 2000, a total of 954 criminal aliens have been apprehended. At the current

pace, the Salt Lake City office will likely exceed 1,200 apprehensions this fiscal

year.

DETENTION AND REMOVALS OF CRIMINAL ALIENS

Since 1998, the INS has significantly increased its detention capabilities in the

State of Utah. We have added detention space in Summit and Washington County

jails and have access to detention space in the new Davis County facility. At

present, we have 130 detention beds available, representing an increase of more

than double the capability we reported in 1998.

We remain convinced, however, that detention should be as brief as possible to

allow resources to be better spent in other areas of the removal process. We have

increased our transportation capabilities so that criminal aliens can be removed

from Utah by a variety of means. The Justice Prisoner and Alien Transportation

Service (JPATS) now flies into Salt Lake City once a week to remove criminal aliens

from local detention. In addition, we remove criminal aliens using JPATS out of Las

Vegas, Nevada, or by overland transportation to Denver, Colorado or El Centro,

California. We are currently transporting criminal aliens on an average of five times

a week using one or more of these transportation options. The average length of

time a criminal alien spends in INS detention in Utah is three days.

57

DETERRENCE

Without meaningful deterrence, criminal aliens will be able to reestablish themselves in our communities and continue their unlawful activities. Since 1997, this

office has worked closely with the United States Attorney’s Office to establish and

maintain a comprehensive prosecutions program directed against criminal aliens

who have been deported and have reentered the United States illegally. I have attached to the written copy of this testimony a graph which shows the marked increase in prosecutions as a result of our joint efforts. I am sure that the United

States Attorney will address this program in greater detail in his testimony.

I would only comment on one aspect which these data illustrate. You will notice

that monthly prosecutions peaked in calendar year 1998. During that year, the

United States Attorney’s Office indicted 313 criminal aliens under federal immigration laws. In the subsequent year, the total number of indictments was 251. In the

first half of calendar year 2000, 126 criminal aliens were indicted, which puts us

on a pace to slightly exceed last year’s total. There is some evidence in these numbers that some criminal aliens are either not returning to the United States after

deportation, or at least are not returning to Utah. While the goal has certainly not

yet been achieved, we believe there are grounds for cautious optimism that the deterrence program is working in Utah.

QUICK RESPONSE TEAMS

As you know, Mr. Chairman, language in the 1999 Appropriation Law authorized

the creation of INS Quick Response Teams (QRTs) in eleven states, including Utah.

We now have Special Agents and Detention Enforcement Officers in Ogden, Provo

and St. George, in addition to our law enforcement presence in Salt Lake City. Our

presence in southern Utah fills a significant demand from local law enforcement

agencies in that area for INS support. While we believe it is still too early to evaluate the performance and effect of the St. George QRT, I am pleased to report that

since October, 1999, that office has arrested 791 smuggled aliens destined to the interior of the United States, including a number of criminal aliens destined for Salt

Lake City. In addition, in the last nine months, our agents in the QRT locations

have responded to 714 requests for assistance from local law enforcement agencies

and have presented 44 cases for prosecution.

For the long term, we believe that the additional personnel we have received in

Utah will permit us to build upon the current success by allowing us to support narcotics enforcement efforts more effectively. We are currently planning with local law

enforcement agencies to support drug enforcement taskforces. Our role will be to

target those criminal aliens involved in this activity and to ensure their apprehension, detention and deportation, as well as criminal prosecution for reentry where

appropriate.

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, let me reaffirm the commitment of the Denver District and the Salt

Lake City Office to support narcotics enforcement efforts in the State of Utah. I

want to thank you, Mr. Chairman, for asking me to testify today, and for the support of INS law enforcement efforts you have shown us in the past, I will now be

happy to answer any questions.

Chairman HATCH. Well, let’s move the panel in. I would like to

introduce our first panel of witnesses. This panel will discuss what

is being done to address the illegal drug problem in this area and

ideas for solutions. First I’d like to welcome Paul Warner, who is

our U.S. attorney for Utah. Mr. Warner and his representatives

have prosecuted drug cases, gang crimes and criminal re-entry

cases and is a significant reason why recent statistics show decreases in crime rates in our State.

Next we’ll hear from Don Mendrala. Don is the assistant special

agent in charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration in Utah.

These guys are really heroic figures; they really risk their lives for

us. And Mr. Mendrala leads the front line DEA agents who are trying every day to reduce the trafficking and use of methamphetamine and other illegal drugs into our State.

58

We’re also very pleased to have our own Scott Burns, who is here

today, as one of the Iron County attorneys who has a distinguished

record of prosecuting those who violate drug laws in Iron County.

There is no better prosecutor in the State, and we’re very fortunate

that you take time to be here with us.

Next we’ll be pleased to hear from Captain Russell Peck, who’s

a great guy, from the St. George Police Department. Captain Peck

works not only on drug crimes in the State, but he’s also worked

on crimes that are drug related or caused by drugs. We commend

your efforts and are pleased to have you here to share your perspective with us today.

So we’re happy to welcome you all to our hearing, it is entitled

‘‘Emerging Drug Threats and Perils Facing Utah’s Youth.’’ And

we’ll turn to you, Mr. Warner, and take your testimony first.

PANEL CONSISTING OF PAUL M. WARNER, U.S. ATTORNEY FOR

THE DISTRICT OF UT; DON MENDRALA, ASSISTANT SPECIAL

AGENT IN CHARGE, DRUG ENFORCEMENT ADMINISTRATION, UTAH; SCOTT BURNS, IRON COUNTY ATTORNEY; CAPTAIN RUSSELL PECK, ST. GEORGE POLICE DEPARTMENT

STATEMENT OF PAUL M. WARNER

Mr. WARNER. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman, and thank you very

much for the kind introduction. I have the honor of being the U.S.

attorney for the District of Utah, and I greatly appreciate the opportunity of being here and testifying today.

And with your permission, Mr. Chairman, I would merely surmise my major points today and, as I understand, the committee

has received my entire statement, and I would ask that that be

made part of the record.

Chairman HATCH. Without objection we’ll make it part of the

record.

Mr. WARNER. Thank you. Before I begin my more specific remarks, Mr. Chairman, I’d like to on behalf of all law enforcement

in Utah to compliment you on your great efforts on behalf of law

enforcement, not only here in the State but throughout the country,

and for your leadership in the Judiciary Committee in terms of providing resources to law enforcement and the Department of Justice

in enabling us to do our jobs much better because of those efforts.

Chairman HATCH. Well, thank you.

Mr. WARNER. The focus of today’s hearing, of course, is the drug

problem here in Utah. Club drugs such as Ecstasy, GHB and others, although not perhaps reaching the attention that methamphetamine has recently in our State, are certainly becoming an increasing problem. Approximately 10 years ago I had the opportunity, if

you want to call it that, of prosecuting perhaps the first Ecstasy

case in the State. It involved a young man who was manufacturing

Ecstasy and then trading it to support his cocaine habit. At that

time such a case was a rarity, and unfortunately we can no longer

say that today. The problem is real and it seems to be getting

worse.

We recently filed an importation case, an Ecstasy case, involving

hundreds of thousands of tablets of Ecstasy that was being imVerDate 11-MAY-2000 02:04 Sep 13, 2001 Jkt 073821 PO 00000 Frm 00062 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\C821.XXX pfrm03 PsN: C821
59

ported from Europe to the State of Utah using commercial private

carriers such as Federal Express, DHL and UPS.

This is not the only case we dealt with. There was a seizure here

in Southern Utah by the highway patrol, it’s currently under review for Federal charges, which clearly indicated that Ecstasy was

headed for distribution here in our own State.

Now, the target group for this terrible and powerful drug is the

youth of our State, ages 16 to 25. Unfortunately, because of the nature of our people in Utah, we perhaps are more susceptible to a

drug like Ecstasy because we accept the mistaken idea that it is

a so-called safe drug or clean drug. According to reality, it is neither.

We intend in my office to continue to aggressively work with

State and local officials, of course our DEA, to do all in our power

to combat these club drugs.

I’d like to talk about methamphetamine for just a minute because that is truly an epidemic problem in the State of Utah and

throughout the west, beginning to be throughout the entire United

States. In my 25 years of experience as a prosecutor, in my estimate, methamphetamine is the top threat to public safety in our

State today.

There are two components to the methamphetamine problem in

Utah, the first being the home-grown variety or the clandestine

labs. As you correctly commented in your opening remarks, Mr.

Chairman, there were 266 clandestine labs taken down last year in

1999 in our State. Unfortunately, we are on a similar pace this

year, having taken down over 178 labs so far. These labs present

a great threat to our public safety, not only because of the methamphetamine that they manufacture, but because often we find, or

as we find, that when the DEA agents and other law enforcement

agencies enter these labs they find minor children in these labs

that are literally crawling about the paper—excuse me, the glass

works and other chemicals, such as illustrated on your table over

on the other side of the room, and as such, many very heart-rendering stories about the total status of these children who are neglected and abused in these meth lab environments.

The other aspect of our meth problem in Utah is the second component is what I call our Mexican meth. Mexican meth evolves

from large commercial labs in Mexico and Southern California. It

works its way here to Utah via network of criminal aliens and others who bring that meth to Utah for shipment throughout the

United States because of our borders of I–15, I–70 and I–80. This

methamphetamine, unfortunately, doesn’t always leave the State.

Much of it is left right here in Utah to be distributed to our own

citizens.

We have seen a dramatic increase in our office in meth cases in

the last 5 years. When I first came to the U.S. attorney’s office over

10 years ago, cocaine was clearly the drug of choice. It was clearly

the drug that we saw in most of our drug cases. Now, I would estimate that over 90 percent of our cases, drug cases, involve methamphetamine.

We have tried to use the resources that through your efforts and

the efforts of the Department of Justice have been given to us,

we’ve increased our drug section in terms of numbers of prosecuVerDate 11-MAY-2000 02:04 Sep 13, 2001 Jkt 073821 PO 00000 Frm 00063 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\C821.XXX pfrm03 PsN: C821
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tors and, accordingly, the number of drug prosecutions are on the

rise. Unfortunately, there seems to be no lack of cases to prosecute.

One of the aspects of dealing with the meth problem in our State,

Senator, is to deal with this criminal alien problem. I want to emphasize that they’re not the sole problem here or the sole factor,

and I also want to emphasize that we’re not talking about lawabiding citizens or members of the Hispanic communities; we’re

talking about people who come to this country, who make a sole

living of a criminal livelihood. Through your efforts, Senator, the

Federal prosecutors, and a number of INS agents dramatically in

the last few years, through those efforts we have prosecuted close

to 1,000 criminal aliens that have been involved in drug trafficking

in our State, and that’s 1,000 criminal aliens who are still in Federal prisons because of the substantial sentences that they received

without any parole, and they are no longer on the streets distributing their methamphetamine.

A second factor, another part of the problem that we’ve been trying to address, is that of guns. As the committee is well aware,

there’s been a great debate about gun control in our country, but

there could be no debate about the fact that felons who use guns

in crime have no business possessing those guns and they should

be aggressively prosecuted. And we’ve been pursuing those people,

particularly those who have been involved in drug trafficking when

we find a gun on them, and we have opened a special project called

CUFF, the Criminal Use of Firearms by Felons. We have put some

new resources into that project, two new prosecutors. I’m happy to

report that we filed over 80 cases this year.

Chairman HATCH. Is that number 80?

Mr. WARNER. Over 80.

Chairman HATCH. I’ve been pushing the administration for a gun

project that came out of a project in Virginia that really became a

very, very effective project where the Federal prosecutors working

in collaboration with the local prosecutors were able to make a real

dent.

One of my criticisms of this administration they all want to make

gun control laws, they’re not enforcing over 20,000 laws that are

on the books today. That’s where I have my difficulty there. You’re

citing that if we enforce those laws we don’t have those guns.

Mr. WARNER. Exactly. And I would like to make a point, Senator,

at least one U.S. Senator hears what you’re saying loud and clear.

Chairman HATCH. And that is a increasing number, in spite of

these efforts.

Mr. WARNER. Indeed there are. I’m happy to report that U.S. attorneys around the country are beginning to aggressively pursue

the Federal gun laws that we have on the books, and hopefully will

make a difference, not only in the area of gun violence, but also in

the area of drugs and drug distribution.

Chairman HATCH. It will and will also protect the decent lawabiding gun owners.

Mr. WARNER. Absolutely. And I want to emphasize that we have

no interest in prosecuting law-abiding citizens who want to exercise

their right to keep and bear arms. This has nothing to do with

those folks. This has everything to do with felons who are criminals

and who are involved in violent crime and drug trafficking.

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Let me conclude today, Senator, by simply indicating that we are

appreciative of your leadership and all that you do to provide us

the resources to combat this scourge, this plague of drugs, and particularly methamphetamine, and the club drugs that are addicting

the youth in our State. I pledge to you that we will continue to use

our resources and our best efforts to combat this, and as we receive

additional resources, they will be put to use in this battle.

Thank you very much, and I’ll be happy to answer any questions

from the committee.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Warner follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF PAUL M. WARNER

Good morning, Mr. Chairman [and Members of the Committee]. And thank you,

[Chairman Hatch] for that kind introduction. I have the honor of being the United

States Attorney for the District of Utah, and I greatly appreciate the opportunity

to testify before the Committee on the critical problem of drugs and related crime

in Utah.

With your permission, Mr. Chairman, I will summarize the major points I would

like the Committee to understand, and I request that my entire statement be made

a part of the record.

Before I begin my more specific remarks on the drug crime problems in Utah, permit me to say, Senator Hatch, that I believe that few people serving in Washington

are as well attuned to this issue as you are, and that few have done as much as

you to address it. That support is needed and appreciated by law enforcement here

in Utah, and I believe around the country.

One focus of today’s hearing is the explosion of so-called ‘‘club drugs’’—Ecstasy,

GHB, and others. About ten years ago, I had the opportunity to prosecute what may

have been the first Ecstasy case in Utah. It involved a young man who was manufacturing Ecstasy, and selling it to support his cocaine habit. At the time, the case

was a rarity, and even today, we are fortunate that these club drugs have not yet

emerged as strongly as they have in other areas of the country.

Still, the problem is real, and poised to get worse. For instance, my office is prosecuting an Ecstasy importation scheme involving a significant quantity of the drug,

which would have supplied thousands of users. These drugs were being imported

from Europe into the United States, through Provo, under a complex scheme using

private carriers such as Federal Express, DHL, and UPS as apparently unwitting

couriers. It appears the drugs were destined for the streets of California.

Even though in this case the Ecstasy apparently was not intended to be distributed here in Utah, in my view, it is only a matter of time before we see increased

use of these drugs by Utah’s kids. In fact, I understand that the Utah Highway Patrol recently made a significant seizure of Ecstasy intended for distribution in Utah

during an automobile stop in southern Utah. This matter is now being reviewed for

federal charges.

The target age group for Ecstasy is young people between the ages of 16 and 25.

Our children here face most of the same pressures as youth across the country, so

it is no surprise that these drugs would show up here. Indeed, because Utah still

retains much of its small-town innocence from an earlier, less troubled era, our

youth can be particularly susceptible to threats from invidious ‘‘club drugs’’ that are

represented as ‘‘safe,’’ or ‘‘clean’’. My office, in conjunction with our law enforcement

partners around the State, will aggressively prosecute cases involving these drugs,

in an effort to prevent the threat from taking hold here, as have other drugs such

as methamphetamine.

I have been a prosecutor for almost a quarter of a century, and I have been a

federal prosecutor for the past twelve years. Before the President nominated me to

be the U.S. Attorney here in Utah, I had served in the Utah U.S. Attorney’s office

as First Assistant, as Chief of the Criminal Division, and as Violent Crimes Coordinator for the office. Based on my experience, I can tell you without exaggeration

that the meth problem in Utah today is the most serious criminal threat we face

to public safety and the safety and well-being of our children.

There are two key components to the meth problem in Utah. While I believe that

these components certainly exist in other areas of the country that are experiencing

a serious meth proliferation problem, they also rest on factors somewhat unique to

Utah. The first component is the home grown problem—the proliferation of clandestine meth labs. Indeed, Utah has the dubious distinction of having the highest per

capita number of illegal methamphetamine manufacturing operations of any State

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in the Union, and ranks among the highest in the nation in the absolute number

of labs.

This part of the problem involves U.S. citizens operating small labs and producing

comparatively small amounts of very pure meth. Approximately 241 such labs were

taken down in Utah in 1999, and approximately 178 have been taken down so far

this year. The prevalence of these clandestine labs—sometimes called ‘‘tweaker’’ labs, after the common term for meth addicts—is a function of two facts—the highly

addictive nature of methamphetamine, and the ability of addicts to manufacture the

drug themselves, a factor not present with respect to drugs such as cocaine and heroin, for example.

As the Committee knows, meth can be made using chemicals, equipment, and

over-the-counter drugs, all of which are fairly easy to get. With your leadership,

Senator, as well as efforts in the Utah legislature, some key ingredients such as

pseudoephedrine are now harder to get in large quantities than they once were.

However, determined lab operators are still able to get what they need. For instance, a common method used by tweakers to obtain pseudoephedrine is to go to

every store in the neighborhood and buy up to the legal limit—12 grams under Utah

law. The recipe for meth is well-known among users, and I believe that as the purity

of imported meth has decreased, the incentive for users to make their own has increased.

The danger these labs pose to the community, and especially to children in the

homes where labs are set up, cannot be overstated. First, while manufacturing meth

is relatively simple—most of the tweakers operating these labs are not exactly rocket scientists—the process involves combining and heating very volatile chemicals,

and produces highly toxic fumes and residue. Second, the very nature of the meth

addiction unfortunately ensures that the children in the household will be ignored

and abused. Our DEA agents can tell you heartrending stories about addicted children found in appalling conditions in many of the labs they respond to. In fact,

there have even been reports of children in preschool and kindergarten playing

make-believe games of cooking meth.

The second component of the meth problem in Utah is what we call ‘‘Mexican

meth’’. It results in part form our geographic location as a convenient transshipment

point. The result is a significant number of what we call pipeline cases. This component of Utah’s problem, and our responses to it, bear directly on controlling methamphetamine proliferation in Utah and throughout the United States. Meth is being

produced in massive quantities in large labs in Mexico, as well as in southern California and other western states. Utah’s proximity to the national border, and the

convergence of three primary travel corridors—I–70, I–80, and I–15—within the

state combine to make Utah uniquely situated to serve as a major transshipment

point of this Mexican meth.

Unfortunately, we are finding that much of the drug is staying in Utah and other

Inter-Mountain states as well. For example, after an eighteen month investigation

by the FBI and other law enforcement agencies, just last week we broke up two

major and interconnected drug trafficking organizations operating in Salt Lake City

and Ogden. The take-down of the Olmedo and Sanchez drug trafficking organizations, or DTOs, resulted in the indictment and arrest of over 25 people and the seizure of at least ten pounds of methamphetamine that had been imported into Utah,

as well as other drugs. These drugs were being distributed here in Utah, as well

as in Idaho and possibly Wyoming.

It is also an unfortunate fact that much of this particular component of Utah’s

meth problem is a direct result of illegal entry by criminal aliens into the United

States, who then come to Utah. Again, as a case in point, most of the individuals

involved in the Olmedo DTO, as well as many of those used by the Sanchez DTO

as runners and suppliers, were criminal aliens.

Additionally, let there be no mistake—these DTOs have an effect on children involved, as well. The most pernicious effect is in passing on the culture of drugs and

lawlessness to another generation. And again, without wishing to prejudice either

the investigation or the prosecution of the recently dismantled DTOs, an example

can be found in those cases. Two persons in the Sanchez DTO have been charged

under the federal law that provides additional penalties for anyone who employs or

uses a minor in a drug trafficking crime. The children involved in these cases deserve a chance to have a different and better life than that of drug dealers.

Let me take just a moment to describe some of what my office has been doing

to address both the meth and the criminal alien problems, which are related. As

you know, Senator Hatch, when I took office as U.S. Attorney, I established two

prosecutive priorities. These priorities are meth and aggravated reentry immigration cases. With your support and the support of Main Justice, these initiative are

bearing fruit.

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First, I was able to obtain two new drug prosecutors, which allowed me to establish within the office’s Criminal Division a new drug section. Utilizing targeted resources provided by Congress and allocated by the Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys, this section is now staffed with 4 attorneys, including two who are dedicated

to OCDETF cases. Even while still staffing up, the results of this section have been

evident. For instance, in FY 1999, we indicated approximately 196 defendants in

about 105 drug cases. This represents a 64.7 percent increase in defendants and a

38 percent increase in cases over FY 1998. Yet these numbers alone do not tell the

whole story. For in the last twelve months, we have successfully dismantled three

major drug trafficking organizations, including the Sundowners Motorcycle Club

DTO, and the recent bust of the Olmedo and Sanchez DTOs, which I already discussed.

As a reflection of the growing problem with methamphetamine in Utah and the

commitment by federal law enforcement to attacking the problem, allow me to provide a comparison of defendants indicted in OCDETF cases within the last two

years. In FY 1998, a total of 32 defendants were indicted in the District of Utah

through OCDETF investigations, many of whom were indicted for methamphetamine offenses. By comparison, in FY 1999, OCDETF investigations resulted in the

indictment of 91 defendants, and nearly all of those defendants were indicted for

a meth offense. In the first ten months of FY 2000, we have obtained indictments

against 53 defendants in OCDETF cases, including the 31 defendants indicted as

a part of the Olmedo and Sanchez DTOs.

The point of relating these numbers is not only to inform the Committee of what

we are doing to tackle the meth problem in Utah, but also emphasize the severity

of the problem. Even with the substantial and ever increasing number of defendants

and cases we are handling, we are only scratching the surfafe of the problem—there

is a seeming endless supply of new cases.

The same can be said of the second prong of our initiative, which involves aggressively prosecuting criminal alien cases. I understand that this can be a sensitive

subject, and that the link between these cases and the meth problem may not be

readily apparent to some. It must be emphasized that the criminal alien initiative

is not targeted at our law-abiding Hispanic population. It is that population we in

large measure seek to protect. Indeed, the code name for the investigation into the

Olmedo and Sanchez DTOs was ‘‘Los Chacales,’’ which in Spanish means ‘‘the Jackals,’’ and is a derogatory term within the law-abiding Hispnaic community for drug

dealers. It is my view that because of the prevalence of Mexican meth, and the convenience of Utah as transshipment and distribution point, the criminal alien and

drug trafficking cases are intimately intertwined, and that we cannot get a handle

on the meth problem without also attacking the criminal alien problem as well.

Thanks to your commitment, Senator Hatch, and the commitment of the Attorney

General, we have added personnel resources in the U.S. Attorney’s office as well as

at the INS to aggressively pursue these cases. Again, we are showing results. In

calendar year 1996, our office indicted 80 criminal alien cases. In 1997, we indicted

194 such cases, in 1998, 313, and in 1999, 251. So far in calendar year 2000, about

120 such cases have been brought. The vast majority of the criminal alien cases we

are doing involve defendants with drug trafficking convictions, as well as lengthy

criminal histories. In addition to the immigration offenses, many of these are methamphetamine related cases. Our program has been successful.

Finally, Mr. Chairman, let me briefly note a third aspect of our drug crime

initative—the targeting of the illegal use and possession of firearms by criminals.

The link between the illegal use and possession of firearms and drug crime is well

known, and here in Utah, we have initiated Project CUFF—Criminal Use of Firearms by Felons—to aggressively prosecute these cases. I am pleased to say that both

the name of the initiative and the resources to pursue it are a result of your efforts

in the Senate. And let me be clear—we are not prosecuting law-abiding citizens exercising their constitutional right to keep and bear arms. Rather, we are targeting

those felons who use guns to commit crimes, thereby endangering the whole community and denigrating the rights of everyone else. I have assigned a top AUSA to

Project CUFF, and I am adding another one next month. The initiative has resulted

in nearly eighty cases accepted for federal prosecution since January.

In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, our drug problem in Utah is severe, and poses significant threats to our youth. And while some aspects of the problem are unique to

my District, the meth problem—and the broader drug problem—certainly is not.

Yet, we are taking steps to tackle the problem. It is a problem we are tackling on

several fronts—including the home-grown, clandestine lab, the so-called Mexican

meth, and staying ahead of the curve on the threat posed by the new generation

of club drugs. Your leadership, and the support of the Department of Justice, has

given us many tools and resources to do this.

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Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I would be pleased to answer any questions from

the Committee.

Chairman HATCH. Thank you, Mr. Warner. We’re happy to have

you. You’re a wonderful U.S. attorney and one of the outstanding

attorneys across the country.

We turn to you, Mr. Mendrala, as head of the DEA in this state,

and we’re very honored to have you here to talk about these things.

STATEMENT OF DON MENDRALA

Mr. MENDRALA. Thank you. Senator, I’ve been here 4 years.

When I first moved in a neighbor came over and introduced himself

to me, I introduced myself back to him, and he said, I’m glad to

know you, but I’m sorry that we need someone like you in this

State.

I wish we didn’t need the DEA in here. Sadly we do. And I’d like

to take this opportunity to thank you for the support you have

given us. Our office has increased tenfold over the past few years.

The cost, the meth cost, that we hear about in Utah costs this

State $1 million. Without the funding that you helped us secure

through hiring DEA agents and the pot shots recently and the new

awareness, the DEA cleans up labs, this State would literally be

brought to its knees due to the fiscal note attached to methamphetamine.

One of the most painful questions that I’m asked all the time is

why Utah. Why is Utah is so high in ranking when it comes to

methamphetamine. It’s truly—— Chairman HATCH. High? What are we ranked?

Mr. MENDRALA. Right now we’re eighth.

Mr. BURNS. Which is good news. We were third.

Chairman HATCH. Two years ago. And that’s a step down. That’s

outstanding.

Mr. MENDRALA. As you stated we closed down 266 meth labs last

year. Our office responded to 246 of those.

Our agents are very tired. When we talk about meth, it doesn’t

mean any of the other drugs here have stopped.

Just to add on a little of what Mr. Warner said, Mexican trafficking is proliferating in this State. These traffickers are probably

drug dealers, they bring in methamphetamine. They’re bringing in

marijuana, which we are seeing increasingly as a gateway drug to

these others. They’re bringing in heroin, and once heroin entrenches itself here, Senator, this is something that they need

every day when they wake up and go to bed at night. This drug

has to be supported by some type of financial means, generally the

crimes that are associated with heroin across the spectrum.

We’ve got the domestic meth problem which has just been highlighted in the media. We used to be very careful about what we

said about how the drug was produced, what chemicals were used,

the method of manufacture. We don’t have to worry about that anymore, Senator, because the INS has taken away all the secrets. If

there is law enforcement, if there’s pending legislation, if there’s a

problem in the cook method that we don’t know how to make it,

they can get it on the chat room and find out anything they need

to know. There are no longer any secrets when it comes to methamphetamine.

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We see that same carry over into GHB and Ecstasy, how to take

the drugs, how to manufacture the drug, where to get it and what

to do if you overdose. This is very, very disturbing to us.

We work with highway patrol on Operation Pipeline. As Mr.

Warner again stated, there was a stop made just outside of Beaver

with Ecstasy. These highway patrol stops historically will be made

on our highways, that they were going to points beyond. That’s no

longer the case. At least half of the pipeline stops now that are

drugs are destined to stay in Utah.

Chairman HATCH. So what you’re saying is up until recently we

were the crossroads with the transport system to drugs going to

other states but now at least half of them are staying here?

Mr. MENDRALA. Yes. We were a trans shipment point and now

we’re consumer stable. That’s not the trend we want in this State.

With the resources you have given us and will give us we will

put forward our best efforts to put them together productively.

We appreciate you coming to us to our new facility. There would

be nothing that we would like to have greater than to take all the

resources that you have given us and let them be used in another

State. We don’t want this in Utah, we don’t want the problem in

Utah, and we don’t have—we don’t want to keep having to ask for

more resources to deal with this problem. We want it to go away

and we’ll do everything we can to make it do just that.

Chairman HATCH. Well, thank you. We thank you for doing a

great job here. It’s becoming a more increasing problem in this

country, especially with methamphetamine. And now all these

drugs.

Mr. MENDRALA. It’s almost the other side of the double edge

sword with the methamphetamine, these club drugs are not methamphetamine but accepted as such.

Chairman HATCH. OK. Mr. Burns, let’s turn to you. You’re right

here on the firing line.

STATEMENT OF SCOTT BURNS

Mr. BURNS. Well, first of all, Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you

for the opportunity to provide some testimony today. I’ve been the

elected county attorney since 1986, and I’m happy to report as of

this morning one thing that is encouraging to me, that is for those

that use drugs are, in my opinion, becoming dumber and dumber,

which I think helps us.

I had UHP Trooper Larry Orton call me this morning and said,

Burns, what do you think about this? The requirements for road

blocks are extremely strict now, so up the canyon up by Milt’s the

other night we set up a sign that said, ‘‘Drug dog ahead,’’ and

about 20 yards further we had another sign that said, ‘‘DEA agents

in the area.’’ And then we set up a garbage can with a sign and

a light that said, ‘‘If you have any illegal drugs, please deposit

them in this garbage can,’’ and three or four cars actually stopped

and put drugs in the can, and then the trooper arrested them at

the bottom of the canyon.

He said, ‘‘Can we charge them with something?’’

And I said, ‘‘Felony stupid comes to mind right off the bat.’’

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So that’s encouraging to me. Those types of tactics are working

and telling me that people who are using drugs aren’t thinking too

straight.

In 1990 and 1991 a U.S. attorney stated marijuana and cocaine

were what we dealt with, and those were insidious drugs to individuals, but nothing to compare with methamphetamine. And we

had always set up a task force in 1997 with several counties, several law enforcement agencies, and I’m glad to report that with the

seizure laws that you have so strongly supported, and I submit to

you and testify that those are enforced sparingly and only when applicable, we have seized well over a million dollars. We’ve purchased equipment, we’ve trained law enforcement officers, we

bought cameras, and we tried to do—but funded their programs

throughout Iron County, which I think is a model throughout the

county forfeiture monies from the bad guys.

But what we haven’t been able to do is deal with three things—

or two things that I see emerging, and that is with respect to methamphetamine violence. I had never looked at the effect of methamphetamine with respect to violent crime, and I can tell you that

we recently finished a death penalty case in this county where a

women was literally butchered and butchered in front of three

small children, and it is my opinion that at the conclusion of that

investigation, that trial, that death penalty verdict that the cause

of that senseless death and really the ruination of three young people was methamphetamine.

I see Mr. Murphy from the local paper who sat through the preliminary hearing, but he could also testify that we’re now prosecuting the case for a little baby that happened to be introduced

to a methamphetamine party. There’s no doubt about that methamphetamine was being used at the party, people deny having any

contact, but this innocent little child came out of that party with

her chest kicked in and with serious damage to the brain. Violence

due to methamphetamine.

The second issue that I would like to address is that I believe

rural America is being hardest hit. I know you have legislation

pending hopefully that will help us, and we appreciate that, but I

think a lot of the methamphetamine traffickers, and I think Mr.

Mendrala and Mr. Warner will support me on this, that, you know,

they have the idea that, you know, Oppie and Goober are alive and

well in rural Utah, and if you set up a lab out there, we’re not as

likely to get caught.

We’re becoming more sophisticated, we’re catching them now, but

we now end up with the clean-up cost. And I know the governor

more recently talked about running out of funds for that, and

maybe the rural communities have to deal with that. We’re going

to need help because it’s not a rural problem, it’s a Utah problem

and it’s a national problem.

The third thing I want to say and to echo what has been said,

is that we appreciate the enhancement of the DEA in Southern

Utah. You have no idea how the regional office has helped us. And

I work closely with Don and Paul and the agents that are down

here, and that type of expertise is invaluable.

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I want to thank you for your legislation and for the Byrne grant

monies, and I know that you know funds our task force every year.

We spend it, I promise you, sparingly.

And the last thing I wanted to do, and I promise I know politicians so I know it sounds like I’m lying and sucking up, but on May

19 we had a banquet and I had no idea that these hearings were

going to be held. We had a plaque for you. I know your schedule

wouldn’t permit you to be here for our narcotics task force. And

she’s a politician, too, but she will vouch for me that that was our

intent, and I will provide our Chairman of the Iron County Commission to present you that plaque, Lois Bullock.

Chairman HATCH. Well, thank you. She might not want to do it

after I called her Lewis. [Laughter.]

Well, thank you so much.

Ms. BULLOCK. I’m not a Lewis.

Chairman HATCH. Isn’t that nice.

Mr. BURNS. Thank you very much for the opportunity to be here.

Chairman HATCH. Thank you, Scott. You don’t suck up to anybody. I’ve known you for a long time. I worry about you. We appreciate you and we appreciate the work that you’re doing.

Captain Peck, I’m going to turn to you guys.

STATEMENT OF CAPTAIN RUSSELL PECK

Mr. PECK. Thank you.

U.S. Senator Orrin Hatch, hearing members and fellow citizens,

I appreciate this opportunity to appear before you today to discuss

the issue of the drug problem in Washington County and in the

State of Utah. My name is Russell Peck and I’m a captain with the

St. George Police Department. I’m also the commander of the

Washington County Drug Task Force. I have been the commander

since the task force was first organized 3 years ago under the direction of Bob Flowers, chief of the St. George Police Department, Eric

Ludlow, Washington County Attorney, and Glenwood Humphries,

former sheriff of Washington County. The current sheriff of Washington County is Kirk Smith, who along with Bob Flowers and Eric

Ludlow, constitute the governing board of the Drug Task Force.

In my 15 years of law enforcement experience, I have seen methamphetamine use increase dramatically in our area. Methamphetamine is our number one problem and focus of illegal drug use in

Washington County and the State of Utah. Methamphetamine affects us all, both old and young alike. From children, victims whose

parents care more about meth than their kids, to those youth who

abuse drugs. This effects our whole society in such a negative way.

Marijuana is the next biggest problem and is often used in conjunction with methamphetamine. It is also the primary gateway drug.

The clandestine meth labs and the dangers associated with those

labs and the clean-up of toxic chemicals has also been a major

problem in our area. But through the support of government grants

and awards, such as Byrne grants from the Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice and HIDTA (High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas) awards, a great amount of progress has occurred in

our local drug war. This assistance has made a huge impact in our

area towards the quality of life for our citizens. The extreme dedication of those officers on the front line, who at times have worked

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24 straight hours in the investigation, scouting, and tactically securing the suspects of a meth lab, and then processing the lab,

must never be forgotten, but supported and applauded for the sacrifices they make. These police officers on the front line deserve the

respect and the best support our country and government can give.

Our task force consists of only four detectives, one sergeant, and

myself as the commander. We also have one prosecutor from the

Washington County Attorney’s Office, Brian Filter, who has done

a tremendous job assigned to prosecute all task force cases. We also

have an intelligence analyst from the Utah National Guard assigned to our task force.

And, Senator Hatch, I would like to recognize our drug task force

and just ask them to stand momentarily, if they would.

Chairman HATCH. I thought that’s where those guys worked. I

was looking at that group. Don’t tangle with them.

Mr. PECK. I have listed some items that have had a huge impact

in our county and the State of Utah, and they are as follows:

Again, funding for task forces provided by Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice and HIDTA (High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area). This provides much needed training, equipment,

overtime, buy money, operating expenses, facilities, and financial

support. Without this there would be no task force.

The dedication of the police officers, the prosecutors, the support

personnel, finance officers, and all the others who assist and care

about fighting the drug war.

Assistance from the DEA in our area, especially support from the

special agent in charge, Mike DeMarte. Also, resident agent in

charge Don Mendrala and DEA supervisors on Pat Dunn and Geno

Corley. Each has been very supportive.

The support and assistance from the Utah National Guard. They

provide an intelligence analyst working full time for the drug task

force.

The establishment of trained officers to tactically take down

meth labs in our area, as well as process and dismantle them. Prior

to the establishment of the task force, the closest people were from

Salt Lake City. We also utilize the St. George Special Emergency

Response Team on all high risk drug search warrants and clandestine drug lab warrants. Also being able to obtain the necessary

equipment to safely and effectively take down and dismantle meth

labs.

And the cost for the hazardous waste contractors to dispose of

the meth labs taken care of by the DEA.

The aggressive enforcement and prosecution of all involved with

illegal drugs from simple possession to manufacturing and distribution of controlled substances. Many crimes on the periphery, such

as theft, burglary, and crimes of violence are committed by drug

users. Focusing on the drug problem eliminates many other crimes.

Aggressive Utah legislation on possession of precursor chemicals

such as pseudoephedrine, iodine crystals, and red phosphorous has

been a tremendous help.

Education about methamphetamine for retail establishments,

specialized civic groups, youth groups, and citizens. This has been

accomplished through classes taught by task force members, booths

at health fairs, television, radio, and newspapers.

69

Community involvement. Hitting the problem at all angles from

police officers to teachers in the education system. This is a social

problem and not just an enforcement problem.

I have briefly touched on the drug problem in our area and items

that have been a great benefit in our local battle. We are not losing

this war. Our goal is to make it extremely dangerous for drug dealers and users to operate in our county, to reduce the availability

of drugs, drive the price up of illegal drugs and simply make it not

worth the consequences for those that would infect our society. We

have made a lot of progress in the last 3 years and hope for even

more.

Senator Hatch, we deeply appreciate and feel your support and

commitment to the drug war. We appreciate your leadership and

thank you for this opportunity to talk about our area.

I also have a short slide presentation I would like to show you,

Senator Hatch.

Chairman HATCH. Sure.

Mr. PECK. I don’t know if everyone can hear me. I’ll go through

this.

This is a poster, basically was taken—or the photograph was

taken at one of our drug houses. These are just some newspaper

articles about some of our work.

This is an interesting one where a man was arrested for not only

child pornography, but also methamphetamine and paraphernalia

and marijuana.

This is, of course, methamphetamine. This is what it looks like.

One of the precursors pseudoephedrine, it is easily bought at the

stores. And Utah just in the last few years enacted legislation to

make it illegal to possess more than 12 grams of this. This has

been a great help again.

Another precursor chemical iodine crystals, again the Utah legislature has enacted laws that make it illegal to possess more than

two ounces, and that has been a great help.

The other one, red phosphorous, same thing, Utah legislature

now has made it illegal to possess any of this. This has been a

great help.

This is some of the glassware that we see with these clandestine

labs. Some of the chemicals, these are some of the ingredients used

to make methamphetamine that we see down in our area.

Common ingredient Heat, we see some on the table there.

These are some pictures of some meth labs down in our area.

You can see some of the protective equipment that we utilize

that we’ve been able to purchase through HIDTA and also Byrne

grants that have been a great help to us.

Some of our guys on the front lines of our drug task force that

went through the training.

There on the left is a suspect that was in possession of a meth

lab. This individual actually came up from Las Vegas, much like

County Attorney Scott Burns talked about, where they come into

rural Utah. They think that we don’t know anything about it and

try to set up shop here.

This is our meth lab trailer that we use to take down the meth

labs.

70

This is our Special Emergency Response Team. Through some of

our grants and through the DEA we’ve been able to get these men

trained in the site and how to take down a meth lab tactically. It’s

been a great help.

This is some of our guys that are getting ready to go on a briefing, or ready to go on a raid, they’re at a briefing right now.

If you can see the gentleman in the back, right there in the white

coat, he is one of our City Councilmen. We’ve had great support

from our city leaders.

There we have our chief of police Bob Flowers and also Mayor

McArthur has also been at the site and seen some of these things

first hand.

This is the kind of places that we see the meth labs set up temporarily in rural Utah, from a trailer in the city to two nice homes

in a nice residential area.

These are some drug suspects that have specifically admitted

having been on methamphetamine for quite a while. And as you

can see it involves the youth.

And I thought this was an interesting picture. It actually covers

the whole age group. We have a gentleman here that’s probably in

his 50’s, a man here in his 20’s, and this young gal was 13 or 14

years of age.

Another picture of our suspect that came from Vegas, set up

shop. Went through one of our local IFA dealers to buy some crystal iodine, and we were able to, through an investigation, get a

search warrant and take this lab down.

More of our drug suspects.

As you can see, too, we talked a little bit about the firearms and

the weapons that are used in the drug world. We see a lot of this

as well. The police scanners, the weapons. Go right along with

methamphetamine.

This particular gun right here was stolen with another group of

guns, not this gun but another gun in that same group was used

in a homicide over drugs over in the Monticello area.

Again, they have counterintelligence, police magazines, scanners,

frequency guides.

I thought this was kind of ironic, there’s marijuana and Tupak

Shakur with marijuana leaves there and a scale to weigh out their

drugs, and they mockingly say, ‘‘Stop Crime.’’

This is a group of young adults that were at the scene of a search

warrant where a lot of—actually marijuana was found.

We’re finding again a lot of the drug dealers want to protect

what they have. This particular dog was a pit bull, a very vicious

dog that attacked the officers and had to be shot.

This is a drug suspect that was at the scene of a meth lab, he

had actually been cooking for quite a while. We decontaminated his

clothing and shortly after that picture was taken he decided to become violent, and we snapped some pictures while the officers had

to basically wrestle him to the ground to contain him.

Again, methamphetamine is our primary problem, but we also

have marijuana which is a gateway drug. And we have, of course,

growers down in our area. This young man is 18 years of age who

was at the site of this marijuana area.

71

This is sad to see the children that are involved in these kind

of things.

Several of our marijuana drills. And that’s the end of the presentation. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Captain Peck follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF CAPTAIN RUSSELL PECK

United States Senator Orrin Hatch, hearing members, and fellow citizens: I appreciate this opportunity to appear before you today to discuss the issue of the drug

problem in Washington County in the State of Utah. My name is Russell Peck and

I’m a Captain with the St. George Police Department. I am also the commander of

the Washington County Drug Task Force. I have been the commander since the task

force was first organized, three years ago under the direction of Bob Flowers—Chief

of the St. George Police Department, Eric Ludlow—Washington County Attorney,

And Glenwood Humphries—former Sheriff of Washington County. The current Sheriff of Washington County is Kirk Smith, who along with Bob Flowers and Eric Ludlow, constitute the governing board of the Drug Task Force.

In my 15 years of law enforcement experience, I have seen methamphetamine use

increase dramatically in our area. Methamphetamine is our number one problem

and focus of illegal drug use in Washington County and the State of Utah. Methamphetamine effects us all both young and old alike. From children victims whose

parents care more about meth than their kids to those youth who abuse drugs. This

effects our whole society in such a negative way. Marijuana is the next biggest problem and is often used in conjunction with methamphetamine. It is also the primary

gateway drug.

The clandestine meth labs, the dangers associated with those labs, and the clean

up of the toxic chemicals, has also been a major problem in our area. But through

the support of government grants and awards such as Byrne grants from the Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice and HIDTA (High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas) awards, a great amount of progress has occurred in our local drug

war. This assistance has made a huge impact in our area towards the quality of

life for our citizens. The extreme dedication of those officers on the front line, who

at times have worked 24 straight hours in the investigation, scouting, and tactically

securing the suspects of a meth lab, and then processing the lab, must never be forgotten, but supported and applauded for the sacrifices they make. These police officers on the front line deserve the respect and the best support our country and government can give.

Our task force consists of only four detectives, one sergeant, and myself as the

commander. We also have one prosecutor from the Washington County Attorney’s

office, Brian Filter, who has done a tremendous job, assigned to prosecute all task

force cases. We also have an intelligence analyst from the Utah National Guard assigned to our task force.

I have listed some items that have had a huge impact in our county and the State

of Utah. They are as follows:

• Funding for task forces provided by CCJJ (Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice) and HIDTA (High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area). This provides

much needed training, equipment, overtime, buy money, operating expenses, facilities, and financial support. Without this, their would be no task force.

• Dedication of the police officers, prosecutors, support personnel, finance officers,

and all others who assist and care about fighting the drug war.

• Assistance from the DEA in our area, especially support from Special Agent in

Charge, Mike DeMarte. Also, Resident Agent in charge Don Mendrala and DEA supervisors Pat Dunn and Geno Corley. Each has been very supportive.

• The support and assistance from the Utah National Guard. They provide an intelligence analyst working full-time for the drug task force.

• The establishment of trained officers to tactically take down meth labs in our

area, as well as process and dismantle them. Prior to the establishment of the task

force, the closest team was from Salt Lake City. We utilize the SERT (Special Emergency Response Team) team from the St. George Police Department on all high-risk

drug search warrants and clandestine drug lab warrants.

• Obtaining the necessary equipment to safely and effectively take down and dismantle meth labs.

• The cost for the hazardous waste contractors to dispose of the meth lab taken

care of by the DEA.

• The aggressive enforcement and prosecution of all involved with illegal drugs

from simple possession to manufacture and distribution of controlled substances.

72

Many crimes on the periphery such as theft, burglary, and crimes of violence are

committed by drug users. Focusing on the drug problem eliminates many other

crimes.

• Aggressive Utah legislation on possession of precursor chemicals such as

pseudoephedrine, iodine crystals, and red phosphorous.

• Education about methamphetamine for retail establishments, specialized civic

groups, youth groups, and citizens. This has been accomplished through classes

taught by task force members, booths at health fairs, television, radio, and newspapers.

• Community Involvement. Hitting the problem at all angles from police officers

to teachers in the education system. This is a social problem and not just an enforcement problem.

I have briefly touched on the drug problem in our area and items that have been

a great benefit in our local battle. We are not losing this war. Our goal is to make

it extremely dangerous for drug dealers and users to operate in our county, to reduce the availability of drugs, drive the price up of illegal drugs and simply make

it not worth the consequences for those that would infect our society. We have made

a lot of progress in the last three years and hope for even more.

Senator hatch, we deeply appreciate and feel your support and commitment in the

drug war. We appreciate your leadership and thank you for this opportunity to talk

about our area.

Chairman HATCH. Well, thank you. That was very interesting. It

gives people a first hand look at some of the things you’re doing.

A lot of people don’t realize that Utah is a methamphetamine

State. And if you look west of the Mississippi you see an awful lot

of methamphetamine shutdowns and very few east of the Mississippi. And even in the new areas, in the far eastern part of the

country, but it’s moving rapidly there.

Three years ago we were the third largest methamphetamine lab

shutdown state, which was shocking to me. Now we make better

records, we may have better law enforcement, and that’s one reason why we were so high. Still it’s shocking to find that they’re

having that kind of influence in Utah.

And, as Mr. Mendrala said, you know, before they didn’t stay,

but now a good 50 percent of these drugs stay here.

Well, let me just say this: The administration has decided that

they have seen that drug use since 1997 has decreased by 13 percent and appears to be leveling off for the first time since it began

to increase in 1992; however, it should be pointed out that use

among young age groups is remarkably higher now than in 1992.

For me the problem is, and I hope that you will all agree, that

even if teen use is leveling off, it is leveling off at an unacceptably

high rate. For example, a study of drug use among eighth graders

since 1992 has increased by 129 percent for marijuana, by 80 percent for cocaine use, and by 100 percent for crack and heroin; the

use of crack and heroin. This is among our teenagers.

Initially the perception was that youth drug use was described

only in our urban areas and that, of course, has proven to have

been mistaken, too. According to a recent report funded by the

DEA, illegal drug use among teens is noticeably higher in rural

America than in urban and suburban areas.

Now, that’s astounding to me. The report found that eighth graders living in rural areas compared to eighth graders living in urban

areas, are 104 percent more likely to use amphetamines, including

methamphetamine, 50 percent more likely to use cocaine, 30 percent more likely to smoke marijuana, and 83 percent more likely

to use crack cocaine.

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Now, this is particularly troubling to me representing a State

that is considered a rural state.

Now, let me ask you again, Mr. Warner, what do you think accounts for this drastic increase and what really, in addition to what

you have already said, are the strategies for bringing this down?

Mr. WARNER. To be very candid with you, Senator——

Chairman HATCH. You see, I’m really wondering what we can do

to protect our teenagers.

Mr. WARNER. I think there’s a couple things that need to be recognized. One’s been alluded to here already, but I want to emphasize that one point. And this isn’t a law enforcement problem, per

se, this is a problem for all of us. And law enforcement isn’t going

to solve this problem alone. As good as the efforts are, and they

have been wonderful in this State, in my opinion, and the cooperation between State, local, and several law enforcement officials and

prosecutors has been outstanding in Utah and has been a model for

the rest of the Nation. But, unfortunately, it is a problem that we

can’t prosecute out of existence.

And so education and public awareness is a huge factor, in my

opinion. We need to join forces with a variety of groups, church

groups, schools, PTA, you name it, to help educate our youth, help

them understand such things as we refer to marijuana as the gateway drug. I think our youth need to understand that. I think they

need to understand that the dangerous effects of Ecstasy, as an example, that it’s not a safe drug. There is no such thing as a safe

drug, as one leads to another. And I think through that kind of a

joint effort we’re going to be making headway.

But, unfortunately, from the law enforcement perspective I don’t

see us being able to turn the corner alone, because by the time we

see these people and by the time we see the cases, the damage is

done.

Chairman HATCH. Anybody else care to comment? I’ll agree with

that.

Let me ask you a question specifically while we’re with you,

Paul, I know that you made a high priority of prosecuting criminals

who illegally enter into our country after having been deported

with a criminal record. Your office has handled hundreds of these

so-called aggravated re-entry cases. Your efforts are very important

to the Utah crime reports because the population of illegal aliens

with criminal records is responsible for the significant percentage

of the crime rate along the Wasatch Front.

But I would like to know the link, if there is one, between these

criminals who are re-entering the country and the emerging drug

threat that we’re talking about today, and I don’t want to limit it

to the Wasatch Front, I want to consider the rural areas as well.

Mr. WARNER. Well, there’s no question there’s a link, Senator,

between criminal aliens and our drug problem. They are part of the

distribution network, if you will. Much of the methamphetamine

that I refer to the so-called Mexican meth is being brought to the

United States and subsequently to Utah by these criminal aliens.

They are part of the distribution network as well. So they’re being

used to bring it up from Mexico and they’re being used to distribute

it within Utah.

74

We just indicted two major drug trafficking organizations last

week involving over 25 individuals that were indicted. The majority

of those individuals were criminal aliens that were involved in Salt

Lake City and Ogden in the trafficking of methamphetamine and

other drugs.

This is a huge problem for us in Utah. The link is clear. Unfortunately, INS has brought in quick response teams for St. George,

Provo and Ogden that will enable us to get out beyond just the

Wasatch Front, if you will, in terms of our enforcement efforts on

criminal aliens throughout the State.

Chairman HATCH. Don, let me ask you this question: Utah has

one of the largest per capita numbers of methamphetamine labs in

the country. Now, that’s an alarming statistic, but even worse

there seems to be a large amount of methamphetamine being imported into the State of Utah from outside the State and the country, and Paul has alluded to that.

What percentage of Utah’s meth problem has come out of the

State and what are its major sources? And keep in mind any of the

other ones that care to comment.

Mr. MENDRALA. The major source for us is Mexico, Mexican traffickers. It’s interesting.

Chairman HATCH. Put that microphone a little closer.

Mr. MENDRALA. With the Mexican meth that comes up here, one

pipeline stop, for instance, could count for 20 pounds, maybe more.

We’ve had as high as 30, 40 pounds. That single seizure will account for more methamphetamine than all the 266 labs that were

shut down.

Chairman HATCH. What are you referring to, the worth value on

the street?

Mr. MENDRALA. Right now at least $10,000 per pound, if it’s sold

at wholesale.

Chairman HATCH. If you sell it at retail——

Mr. MENDRALA. Retail is in the millions.

Chairman HATCH. In the millions?

Mr. MENDRALA. The percentage that we’re seeing now Mexican

meth versus the domestic meth is at least 50 percent of the seizures we’re making, again because it’s somewhat skewed, the Mexican traffickers are able to bring in so much more meth than these

domestic labs are capable of producing. So although our resources

a lot of times are devoted to the clandestine labs, which is a real

local and community issue, for several reasons, toxic waste, and so

forth, the real bulk of the drug is coming from Mexico.

Chairman HATCH. Well, methamphetamine lab and seizures continue to rise dramatically here across the west as a whole. Increasing amounts of the drugs coming to the United States from Mexico,

as you mentioned, and what was once a problem largely confined

to the southwestern part of the country, is now rolling across the

whole country and right into the east coast.

Mr. MENDRALA. Absolutely.

Chairman HATCH. In Utah alone DEA lab seizures have risen

from 29 in 1995 to over 200 last year, and that number does not

even account for seizures at State and local offices. Now, this is occurring despite the fact that I and many other legislators at all levels of government have worked hard to draft laws to provide addiVerDate 11-MAY-2000 02:04 Sep 13, 2001 Jkt 073821 PO 00000 Frm 00078 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\C821.XXX pfrm03 PsN: C821
75

tional tools specifically directed to the methamphetamine problem.

I’d like to know have these tools proved beneficial to you, if not,

how can we to do a better job to get more tools to solve these problems? And I would like all four of you to respond to that question,

if you would.

Mr. MENDRALA. They’ve been very helpful, especially in regard to

the precursor chemicals. It’s a simple formula, if you don’t have the

chemicals, you can’t make the meth. So if we’re able to shut down

the supply of chemicals, limit the supply of chemicals that people

can have lawfully, the methamphetamine problem is diminished.

Chairman HATCH. I know that the DEA has been working very

hard to stop these clandestine chemical manufacturers that are

making with organized crime, for instance. Do you have anything

to comment, Mr. Warner?

Mr. WARNER. Just to echo on what Don said, I think it’s important to keep in mind that meth is different from other drugs that

we have dealt with in the past because it’s manufactured by the

users often. Cocaine, heroin, it’s not manufactured by the people

that are using. But people because methamphetamine is a drug

that is manufactured in these clandestine labs that this attack on

the precursor chemicals is very, very important. And through your

efforts, Senator, and through the efforts of the Utah Legislature to

limit the amounts of availability on these precursors, labs—excuse

me, the precursor chemicals make a big difference. It’s helped a lot.

And I think that the other thing that’s important is our ability

to punish adequately the difference between those who manufacture this chemical or this drug and those who simply use it, again,

because it is a manufactured drug.

And so I know that your meth bill that you provide a special penalty for those who manufacture and I think that was very important. Because I think there is a distinction in culpability between

those who would actually produce the drug for others and those

who are merely using. When I say merely, I’m not justifying, but

I’m saying by way of comparison.

Chairman HATCH. Scott, any comments?

Mr. BURNS. Just to echo what Paul was saying. As you may recall, Utah was embarrassingly one of the last States in the country

to control pseudoephedrine. We were the place. We were the Home

Depot for the meth consumption of the United States of America.

And they went up and down our freeways.

Here in Iron County we finally started arresting them and attempted manufacturers of methamphetamine. That didn’t go over

well with Paul Van Dam, then the attorney general, the then U.S.

attorney. But I would echo everything that they said and that is

you cut off the chemicals, if they don’t have the flour, they can’t

make the cake. I think we’re doing a lot better in those efforts.

Mr. PECK. I would agree, Senator Hatch. I think that some of the

recent Utah legislation on the precursor chemicals has made a tremendous difference and helped us out a lot.

And you asked the question a little bit about the tools that we’ve

had available through the funding of HIDTA and the Byrne grants,

that’s been a tremendous help for us. Especially now in St. George,

and I know for Cedar City as well, we’re—we kind of have to stand

on our own two feet. We can’t rely on the bigger agencies from Salt

76

Lake City or anywhere else. Las Vegas is a couple hours away, but

they’re in a totally different jurisdiction.

So we have to be prepared, basically, to handle our own down

here in the corner of the State. And those different programs have

just been a tremendous help for us down here.

Chairman HATCH. Well, thank you.

Scott, tell me, a lot of young people think that they can just take

methamphetamine and get right off of it if they want to, enjoy it

for a little, or with Ecstasy or these other club drugs. What’s your

experience with that?

Mr. BURNS. Well, in part I would defer that. I understand that

Bradley Davis is here. I want to commend him, he’s a person that

I even prosecuted on a couple of occasions, and I think he can better address that than I can.

But, Senator, the people that I have talked to tell me literally

that once addicted to this drug, and often times it takes one time,

one Saturday night, one friend saying try this, one time, they will

give up their children, they will leave their wives and husbands,

they will miss house payments, they will not eat, they will miss car

payments. They will give up everything in their life for that next

fix. And it is—again, I think the studies bear out you talk about

heroin, but my experience has been in talking to those people have

been addicted to it, it is the most difficult drug to kick.

Chairman HATCH. In Iron County here have you prosecuted a lot

of meth cases here? Have you had a lot of problems in methamphetamine here in this area?

Mr. BURNS. You know, for rural Utah in comparison to the

Wasatch Front, they might giggle, for us it is a huge problem. And

tantamount to that we’re finding that our burglaries and robberies,

and a lot of crime are directly related to methamphetamine. You

lose your job, you don’t have money, you steal. So it’s a tremendous

problem for us.

Chairman HATCH. Another pressing issue on this topic concerns

the clean-up of the methamphetamine labs. You’ve all alluded to

the fact how dangerous they are, with the record number of lab seizures in the State the DEA and the State are running out of resources to handle the clean-ups. In light of this I was amazed to

learn the Clinton administration rejected our request in this year’s

budget for $21 million for lab clean-up. And despite this rejection

of funds, there has been new money allocated to Utah for clean-up

and recently I’ve been informed that the money will be distributed

soon.

But, nonetheless, we’re going to end up with the same predicament in the future unless the administration takes the problem seriously.

Now, Mr. Mendrala, has the DEA been able to discuss this issue

with members of the administration or anyone else in the administration? Does the DEA have a backup plan where the administration fails again to fund any of those plans?

Mr. MENDRALA. Senator, originally that money lasted a lot longer

than it did, but with the number of labs the money literally dried

up overnight.

77

We’ve been engaged in dialogue we’re hoping for more money, because when that money is gone, I don’t know what we’re going to

do.

Chairman HATCH. It’s dangerous to clean up labs.

Mr. MENDRALA. It’s very dangerous.

Chairman HATCH. The guy yesterday said it’s a sitting time

bomb, these labs can explode. They’re environmentally very toxic,

poisonous. They can affect children. They degrade a house or a

rented house where it costs thousands and thousands of dollars to

renovate it after one of these things.

Anything else you care to say about that?

Mr. MENDRALA. No. That pretty well sums it up. It’s the greatest

law enforcement concern we have. If the money goes away, we

won’t have any means.

Chairman HATCH. Mr. Warner and I worked on a case where a

really nice young person and from a very decent family got convicted, went to Federal prison, promised he would get off of it, was

in prison long enough to get off of it, came back out, and really

good kids, decent, wonderful, supportive family, all of a sudden

went right back to it.

In this case the parents I know, since they have a child or son,

I didn’t know what to do and I chatted with them. As we got into

this we found out that probably the best thing for that person

was—he was convicted again. He was sentenced to a Federal rehabilitation facility. And the indication was—and correct me if I’m

wrong, Paul, but the indication was it would take up to 3 years of

intensive Federal rehabilitation and then they would be able to do

to get the person sitting right. The desire will always be there.

You young people need to hear these things as you see one time

can cause them to be addicted to this drug.

Let me just ask you, Scott, and Mr. Peck, in rural areas what

is the extent that we are seeing methamphetamine use in teens

and young adults?

Mr. PECK. Senator, if I might answer that. Scott.

Mr. BURNS. Go ahead.

Mr. PECK. Methamphetamine we see it run through the age

gamut what we see through the young adults and marijuana. We

do see a little bit of methamphetamine use by teenagers but more

marijuana, which is the gateway drug that we send down the meth

road, I would say. Most of our meth users are in their 20’s and 30’s.

But it usually starts out when they’re a teenager with marijuana.

Chairman HATCH. Would you agree with that, Scott?

Mr. BURNS. Yes.

Chairman HATCH. I appreciate you giving us this information because it’s time for your communities to realize how important it is.

Most people don’t hear about it. Most people don’t—you know, you

don’t always put in the newspapers what’s really going on. It’s

shocking. And it’s happening right here in Utah, a State with good

families and decent moral values, and a State where you think this

isn’t a problem.

We haven’t talked much about the problems where these kids

they’re going to places and they’re selling these club drugs. They’re

putting our kids in danger. And young people are being raped, not

knowing who raped them, because they’re out cold and they have

78

a form of amnesia, and after that they don’t remember. This is a

matter of great concern.

I want to thank all of you for being here today and thanks for

taking this time.

Mr. BURNS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. PECK. Thank you.

Chairman HATCH. Let me call our second panel in. I’ll try to get

back to you.

I am pleased to introduce our second panel of witnesses. This

panel will discuss the scope and effects of the drug problem currently facing our youth in Utah. And our first witness is an old

friend, Tibby Milne, who works with Utah Crime Prevention to

keep our kids off of drugs. We appreciate your work and your willingness to share your thoughts with us today.

Our second panel member is Sandy Harmon, who is the program

director for substance abuse treatment for the Southwest Center in

St. George. Ms. Harmon, we welcome your thoughts and we’re fortunate to have you here today as well.

Next we’ll hear from Barbara Corry from Cedar City the PTA regional director of Region 16. And we commend your efforts as well

in the community to keep our youth away from harmful drugs and

we look forward to your testimony.

Then we’ll hear from two people who have had personal experience with the dangers posed by illegal drugs.

Next we’ll hear from Bradley Davis, who is a convicted methamphetamine manufacturer and dealer who will tell us about his

experience, then Jana Houston will tell her story about the devastation that methamphetamine caused to her and her family when

her husband became involved with meth.

I just want to say we appreciate the willingness of these witnesses, these two witnesses in particular, to share their personal

stories here with us today. So I would like to welcome each of you

to the hearing. And we’ll start with you, Ms. Milne.

PANEL CONSISTING OF TIBBY MILNE, UTAH COUNCIL FOR

CRIME PREVENTION; SANDY HARMON, PROGRAM DIRECTOR

FOR SUBSTANCE ABUSE TREATMENT, SOUTHWEST CENTER,

ST. GEORGE UT; BARBARA CORRY, PTA REGIONAL DIRECTOR, REGION 16, CEDAR CITY UT; BRADLEY DAVIS, CONVICTED METHAMPHETAMINE MANUFACTURER AND DEALER; AND JANA HOUSTON, FAMILY DEVASTATED BY METHAMPHETAMINE

STATEMENT OF TIBBY MILNE

Ms. MILNE. Before I begin my testimony today——

Chairman HATCH. You better pick that mic up.

Ms. MILNE. Before I begin, and I first I have to figure how to

turn this on. OK.

Chairman HATCH. Use that one.

Ms. MILNE. OK. Before I begin my testimony today, there are a

couple things I’d like to do and one is commend to you, Mr. Chairman, Senator Hatch. I have worked with you for many, many years

and have watched as you have demonstrated unwavering commitment to the children and youth from families in this State and

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across the Nation. And I know that’s why you’re here today, and

I just want to commend you for that.

Chairman HATCH. Thank you very much.

Ms. MILNE. Our focus is on prevention because these drugs are

waging a major war against our children and youth.

On March 16, I was called by Don Mendrala to go to the dismantling of a methamphetamine lab that came about as a result of a

tip that had been received on our hotline. We started a program

with the Salt Lake Police Department so we could get people to call

in and report these labs, and we, in turn, would report that information, and our goal was to reduce the problem in our community.

But nothing prepared me for what I saw or what I experienced.

There were two children in the home and they were living in a very

contaminated environment, it was filthy.

And I want to read this because according to the court documents, when the agents arrived, they found a boiling reaction vessel and condenser column near a child’s training toilet. They found

three guns, one loaded, and accessible to the children, I believe

that was at the foot of the beds, the children’s beds. They found

a red phosphorous stained towel that was sitting on a tray that

was to go on the high chair. And they found meth chemicals in the

children’s closet, and also a bowl of moist meth was found on the

coffee table.

Now, the day before this incident happened one of the children

had been run over by a vehicle out in the play area out in front

of the house. He had been left unattended and he was 1 year of

age. He suffered two broken arms and legs, cracked ribs, plus severe head lacerations, and I understand required over a hundred

stitches.

In addition, the parents have refused to identify who the person

was who was driving that vehicle. DFS workers went in, they removed the children from this home, but both of these children tested positive for meth and marijuana.

And I followed the status of these children and have learned that

the one that was injured has recovered but is in therapy, and that

the 5-year-old is in a foster home, but still unable to even identify

his colors. He’s very slow developmentally.

And then I think we need to state here that 60 percent of the

meth labs have children involved, and they’re generally young children under the age of 10. That really helped me begin to realize

it’s more than we see over here, it’s children’s lives. And these kids

are going to cost this State many, many dollars in resources because of what happened.

And then we go into our young mothers who are child bearing

that are having these little babies and using meth. And the concern

I have is for the youth that are using methamphetamine. They

think of it as a diet drug. They think of it as an energy booster,

this is a way to stay up late and get more accomplished and have

a good time. They don’t realize the addiction that can occur and

what this is going to mean to them.

I am worried about the use of the club drugs. I have taught two

victims that have experienced this. These are girls that would not

have taken drugs in any other situation. They thought what they

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were doing was safe and they were drinking drinks that had the

drugs put in them.

I just returned last night from a national DARE conference in

Nashville, TN. They are focusing on club drugs in a big way because of the impact on our youth.

So what we’re committed to doing as a council is really to work

together with parents, law enforcement, schools, and communities

and we’re trying to get persistent consistent messages out to our

children and youth that we don’t use drugs and here is why. And

we’re also trying to get these out to our parents. We work with the

Partnership for Drug Free America. We’re trying very hard and our

media has been very supportive to print the ads, also put them on

the electronic media to get messages to children and their parents.

I brought a great poster for you. This is one of our youth posters,

but this is ‘‘Body by Crystal Meth.’’ We’re trying to get the message

out to kids that this isn’t how you get buff, as the guys like to call

it, and this isn’t how young women can lose weight.

The Partnership for Drug Free America just released their PATS

study in the spring of 1999 and they said that parents and the

youth are listening and that there appears to be an impact, as was

mentioned earlier, in reducing drugs. But they also indicate in this

study that despite the more active role that many parents are overwhelmed by the scope of the drug problem. They don’t know what

to do. They’re losing their confidence and their ability to safeguard

children from drugs.

We know that kids are 50 percent less likely to use it if parents

give them the right messages about drug use. So we’re going into

several areas, and I just want to share a couple of them with you.

A Let’s Talk Utah campaign encouraging parents and kids to talk

together, our DARE officers are going to be in the classrooms giving the lessons that need to be given to young people. We’re excited

about that. Because in this community we have seen a reduction

in the use of drugs by those who have had all three levels of DARE.

Now, I just want to close with something that I thought was

powerful. In Nashville we released a new study that’s done on

DARE kids in Texas, and it showed some of the following by the

kids that are getting these messages. These students have a more

positive perception of police, greater sense of safety in the community and at home, greater family involvement and communication,

increased mutual care and respect within the family. They are

more involved in school activities. They have greater respect for authoritative figures. They are confident of peer intervention with

drug and alcohol abuse and they show lower truancy rates.

We’re embarking on getting DARE officers to teach parents at

the workplace, community centers, and churches, anyplace we can.

We believe that working together, just as you have demonstrated,

all of my life as I’ve been in crime prevention that we can protect

children, our most precious resource. We welcome the opportunity.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Milne follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF TIBBY MILNE

Ladies and Gentleman of the Committee:

On March 16, 2000, I was called by Don Mandrela, Resident Agent in Charge of

DEA, to witness the dismantling of a Methamphetamine Lab immediately following

a raid on a suspected meth lab at an apartment complex.

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On February 3rd of this year, in a joint effort with the Salt Lake City Police Department, we launched a new anti-meth educational campaign titled ‘‘What’s Cooking in Your Neighborhood?’’ Our goal was to assist law enforcement with the possible locations of clandestine labs by providing an anonymous tip line for individuals

to call and report suspicious meth drug activity in their neighborhoods. In addition

to this tip line, we provided information to the public about what to look for in the

way of materials and equipment, smells, etc. Our first lab was about to be dismantled as a result of information received on the tip line.

Nothing prepared me for what I witnessed. All of the usual lab equipment and

chemicals were there. However, there were also two children in this home, and they

were living in a contaminated and filthy environment. According to court documents, when the agents arrived they found a boiling reaction vessel and condenser

column near a child’s training toilet. They found three guns, one of them loaded and

accessible to the children. A red phosphorus stained towel was found in the eating

tray for the high chair. Meth chemicals were found in the children’s closet, and a

bowl of moist meth was found on the coffee table.

The day before, the year old child had been run over by a vehicle. He was apparently left unattended. He suffered two broken arms and legs, cracked ribs, plus severe head lacerations requiring many stitches. The parents refused to provide the

name of the driver. DFS workers who were on the scene at the time of the raid,

removed the second child from the home. Both children tested positive for methamphetamine and marijuana.

I have followed the status of these two children since March 16th and have

learned that the little one that was injured has recovered, but is still in therapy.

The five-year old is in a foster home, but having much difficulty in his development.

These children will more than likely need resources and support from the state

for many years to come. I have learned that 60 percent of Meth labs are located

where there are little children living. What does all of this mean? We have only

begun to realize the impact that meth will have on the precious resources of this

state for many years to come let alone the damage to these innocent children.

We are seeing more and more youth becoming addicted to meth. In Utah, as in

other states with meth production, we know our youth are choosing meth as a drug

of choice, particularly our young women. They think of it as a ‘diet’ drug or energy

booster. Many are taking it innocently, only quickly to find themselves addicted. According to the Utah Division of Substance Abuse, the highest users of meth are

young women in the 18–34 age group. These are also women of childbearing age

and the mothers of little children.

In addition, Utah is beginning to experience a rapid increased use of ‘‘club’’ drugs

(GHB, Ectasy, Rohypnol, and others) by our youth and young adults. These drugs

are often consumed at ‘raves’ (all night dance parties attended by teens) and dance

clubs frequented by teens and or young adults. They are sometimes diluted in a

drink or ingested in some other fashion. These drugs, because of their newness on

the scene, are dangerous due to the perception by our youth that they are ‘safe’

drugs. Many of our youth who would not normally take drugs, are using the date

drugs.

Parents are often unaware that their children are attending events where these

drugs are consumed. At the National D.A.R.E. Conference, being held in Nashville

this week, club drugs are being addressed as a major concern facing our youth.

The Utah Council for Crime Prevention is seriously committed to educating the

community on the dangers of drugs facing our youth, and are conducting several

programs that will empower parents, law enforcement, schools and community together in partnership to provide consistent and persistent anti-drug messages to our

youth. We are about solutions. Through our partnership with the Partnership for

Drug-Free America, we are increasing our efforts to provide anti-drug messages on

radio, television, and in print media focusing on children, youth, and their parents.

As we have already discussed, our ‘‘What’s Cooking in Your Neighborhood?’’ campaign focuses on providing a means for people to report meth labs quickly and anonymously. Our goal is to reduce the amount of meth that is available. We are providing educational posters ‘‘Body by crystal meth’’ and other electronic and printed

materials to educate our youth on the dangers of meth. We are joining with others

to educate parents about this Utah epidemic. The Utah PTA surveyed attendees at

their Annual Convention in May and found that the number one item that parents

identified was the need for more information on drugs.

The Partnership for Drug Free America (PDFA) released their Partnership Attitude Tracking Study (PATS) in the spring of 1999. The study indicates that more

parents, are talking with kids about drugs more often, and appear to be having an

impact.’’ Many parents however still struggle with what to say; one in three parents

doubt they’re getting through.’’

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‘‘Parents are, in no small measure, one of the reasons why adolescent drug use

is finally stabilizing and, in some measure is, declining,’’ said Richard D. Bonnette,

the president and CEO of the Partnership. ‘‘With teenagers, many things go in one

ear and out the other. But what parents are saying about drugs appears to be sticking.’’

The study indicates that ‘‘despite their more active role, many parents are overwhelmed by the scope of the drug problem. This, according to the research appears

to be extracting a price on parents’ confidence in their own ability to safeguard children from drugs.’’ We are designing an educational campaign entitled ‘‘Let’s Talk Utah’’—encour- aging parental and child communication. These messages will be displayed on billboards, posters in schools and areas parents and youth congregate, and through

PSA’s that will receive playtime on the electronic and print media.

Utah D.A.R.E. (Drug Abuse Resistance Education) Officers will continue to

present quality substance abuse and anti-violence lessons in Utah schools. In Cedar

City, we saw a marked reduction in the use of drugs by kids that had received

D.A.R.E. lessons at the elementary, Middle or Jr. High, and Sr. High School levels.

According to research conducted by Dr. Robert Landry of Research Education

Services in Texas, students who participated in the D.A.R.E. Program provided

some of the following core outcomes related to D.A.R.E. students.

They have a more positive perception of police;

They have a greater sense of safety in community and at home;

There is greater family involvement and communication;

There is increased mutual care and respect within the family;

There is more involvement in school activities;

There is greater respect for authority figures;

They are confident of peer intervention in drug and alcohol use; and

They show lower truancy rates.

In addition to their regular teaching assignment, we will call upon D.A.R.E. officers to facilitate parenting classes at school, churches, community centers, and the

workplace. The new D.A.R.E. Parent Curriculum emphasizes communication skills,

shares updated information on drugs and violence in today’s world, teaches coping

skills, and ways to protect kids from violence. Our goal is to arm parents with

knowledge so they will be competent and confident in their responsibility to help

their kids to resist drugs.

The war on drugs can be fought and won if together we work to protect our most

precious resource, our children.

SOURCES

Dr. Robert Landry, D.A.R.E. in Texas (Seminar presentation), National D.A.R.E.

Officers Convention, July 5, 2000.

Partnership for a Drug Free America, 1999 Partnership Attitude Tracking Study,

released 4–11–00.

Chairman HATCH. Thank you for that. We’re happy to have that

testimony.

Ms. Harmon, we’ll turn to your testimony next.

STATEMENT OF SANDY HARMON

Ms. HARMON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman HATCH. Pull that a little closer.

Ms. HARMON. I would like to on behalf of the Southwest Center,

I’d like to welcome you to Southern Utah. We’re thrilled to have

this opportunity to testify before your committee today.

Chairman HATCH. Thank you.

Ms. HARMON. Fortunately as you heard earlier, Washington,

Iron, Beaver, Kane, and Garfield Counties have not been—had a

large impact yet by the GHB, Ecstasy, and club drugs; however, we

continue to deal with the methamphetamine problem. Traditionally

rural America has their drug of choice has been alcohol; however,

since 1991 the number of people who have entered treatment because of alcohol abuse has steadily declined, while methamphetamine use has steadily increased. And this does not mean that we

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on the treatment side and prevention side are finding fault with

the law enforcement officials; we believe that they’re doing an excellent job. And we heard about how many drug labs that they continue to shut down in our area.

However, we believe that we all need to work together with prevention, education, treatment, and law enforcement to solve this

problem.

Our agency offers treatment and prevention services throughout

the five-county area. Prevention programs are designed to increase

protective factors, conditions which decrease the likelihood of drug

use, and decrease risk factor conditions which increase the likelihood of drug use.

And we go into schools and educate the adolescents on what will

happen to them if they use drugs, but we also try to have programs

where that will increase their likelihood not to use, including self

esteem programs, what to do instead, how to say no. And many of

those programs do have good outcomes. The people, the adolescents

that are participating in those programs, are less likely to use

drugs.

But, unfortunately, many young Utah residents still decide to

use illicit drugs. A special concern is the trend for many young

women in our communities use methamphetamine as a diet aid

and produce energy as well as the high associated with use.

The Arrestee Drug Abuse Monitoring, ADAM study, showed that

Utah has the second and third highest number of positive urine

screens for methamphetamine in the Nation, and that includes cities such as Las Vegas and San Diego.

I wanted to address one of the questions that you asked earlier,

and I know Officer Peck answered some of that. And I have statistics that show that youth age under 18 who are being admitted for

treatment, 66 percent of the time they’re being admitted for marijuana use. But by the time they reach age 18 to 24 that’s risen— methamphetamine—or excuse me, and methamphetamine is only

less than 1 percent underage 18. By the time that they go to ages

18 to 24, they are using 24 percent of the time methamphetamine

is their drug of choice.

Women in our area have consistently since 1992 received more

and more admissions. Traditionally men have been more likely to

be admitted for substance abuse; however, that is changing with

methamphetamine, and now females are more likely to be admitted

for treatment for methamphetamine use than males are.

I know that time is short. I just want to let you know that treatment does work and we need to work in partnership with law enforcement. Drug courts around the country are proving that treatment coupled with law enforcement does work.

Addiction is a treatable disease, it’s not a moral failing. We know

that you will be willing to support, continue to support, those programs that allocate modified drug courts with respect to treatment

and subsidize, because usually by the time someone is ready to go

to treatment, they have exhausted all of their resources and they

don’t have money to pay for treatment and get treatment. If we

don’t charge something for treatment, we’re not going to be around

to be able to give treatment. There is some way that has to be

funded.

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And I appreciate again your time, and if you have any questions

I would glad to answer them later.

Chairman HATCH. Thank you very much. We appreciate your testimony.

Ms. Corry, we’ll hear from you.

STATEMENT OF BARBARA CORRY

Ms. CORRY. First I would just like to thank Scott Burns because

I was coming down the canyon on the day when they had the signs

on the drug dogs and the signs about the drug dogs. I didn’t see

those, but I did see a drug stop, and I really wondered what it was.

I’m glad that he—that my interest has been peaked now.

But I would like to commend you, Senator Hatch, for providing

a forum for pertinent information regarding emerging drug threats

to our youth.

As I did research into GHB, Ecstasy and other rave club drugs,

I’m appalled by the availability of these drugs and the lack of understanding by most parents of their paraphernalia and possible

fatal consequences.

Once teens try these drugs, they turn to them as their main way

of coping with stress and problems. These are feel good drugs. They

enhance all of the senses. Our young people can’t imagine that

these drugs are bad when they make them feel so good. At the rave

clubs the pushers are selling these drugs as similar to a caffeine

pill that will just give them energy. But what the pushers aren’t

saying that these drugs raise body temperature, cause dehydration,

grinding of teeth, seizures and possibly death. These gateway drugs

limit a young person’s ability to resist other drugs that are equally

available at the parties.

Parents need to know that some of the paraphernalia for these

drugs are beaded necklaces, lip gloss containers, baby pacifiers,

and dust masks.

NIDA associate director, Timothy P. Condon stated that, ‘‘Accurate, credible information is the most powerful weapon we have to

combat the increasing use of these dangerous drugs.’’

PTA’s part as an advocate for children and youth is that this dialogue will allow parents to check into where and with whom our

youth are spending their time. These insidious drugs are very prevalent in our State and Nation. Parents must work together in various ways to prevent the use of these drugs.

PTA encourages parents to tell your youth not to ingest anything

that is given to them by someone they don’t know. Take time to

listen to your teens. Talk to your teens about learning positive

ways to handle peer pressure. Show your teens you care about

them. Set a good example. Be alert to signs of trouble. Know your

teen’s friends.

PTA, Utah PTA, will step up efforts to inform parents and act

as a conduit between professionals and parents for awareness and

active prevention measures for their youth.

Thank you, Senator Hatch, for the efforts that you are making

to counteract both the availability and the ignorance about these

very destructive drugs.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Corry follows:]

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PREPARED STATEMENT OF BARBARA CORRY

I would first like to commend Senator Hatch for providing a forum for pertinent

information regarding these emerging drug threats to our youth.

As I did research into GHB, Ecstasy and other Rave Club drugs, I was appalled

at the availability of these drugs and the lack of understanding by most parents of

their paraphernalia and possible fatal consequences.

Once teens try these ‘gateway’ drugs, they may continue their drug use and turn

to them as their main way of coping with stress and problems. These drugs are a

‘‘feel good’’ drug. They enhance all of the senses. So our young people can’t imagine

that these drugs are ‘bad’ when they make them feel so good. At the Rave Clubs,

the pushers are selling these drugs as similar to a caffeine pill—that will just give

them energy—what the pushers aren’t saying is that these drugs raise body temperature, cause dehydration, grinding of teeth, seizures and possibly death. These

‘gateway’ drugs limit a young person’s ability to resist other drugs that are equally

plentiful at the clubs or home parties.

Parents need to know that some of the paraphernalia for these drugs are beaded

necklaces, lip gloss containers, baby pacifiers, and dust masks.

NIDA’s Associate Director, Timothy P. Condon states that ‘‘Accurate, credible information is the most powerful weapon we have to combat the increasing use of

these dangerous drugs.’’

PTAs part as a advocate for children and youth is that this open dialogue will

allow parents to check into where and with who their youth are spending their time.

These insidious drugs are very prevalent in our state and nation.

Parents must work together in various ways to prevent the use of these drugs.

PTA encourages parents to:

• Tell your youth not to ingest anything that is given to them by someone they

don’t know

• Take time to listen to your teens

• Talk to your teens about learning positive ways to handle peer pressure

• Show your teens you care about them

• Set a good example

• Be alert to signs of trouble

• Know your teen’s friends

PTA will step up efforts to inform parents and to act as a conduit between professionals and parents for awareness and active prevention efforts for their youth.

Chairman HATCH. Well, thank you, Ms. Corry. That’s excellent

testimony.

Ms. Houston, we’ll turn to you.

STATEMENT OF JANA HOUSTON

Ms. HOUSTON. Thank you. The St. George Police Department

asked me to share with you my story about how meth has affected

my life.

Last June I was picking up my husband’s clothing and I noticed

his socks were stuffed into his shoes. I pulled the socks out and inside the toe of his shoe I found a glass pipe, a lighter, and container of white crystals. I was absolutely shocked, and I wasn’t

quite sure what to do. I left the house, got in my car, I had drove

around for a couple of hours. I cried, I was angry, and I was hurt.

But even though I was so shocked, it also felt like the pieces of the

puzzle that had finally come together, because even though I had

just found drugs that morning, I had been feeling affects of methamphetamine for a long time.

Jeff owned his own business, an Internet company, so he often

worked at night, or he worked long hours. But recently he had

been spending 3 or 4 days straight at the office without coming

home, and when he would come home he would crash and sleep for

2 days straight, and I wouldn’t be able to wake him up, and that

scared me when he acted like that.

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He hardly ate anymore and he lost 20 pounds. The worst of it,

though, was he just ignored me and he had never been like that.

He would lose his temper and become so angry at the smallest

things. For instance, one morning when he got up and he stumbled

over his shoes he left beside the bed, and he just threw into a rage.

He grabbed the lamp, threw it across the room, and it broke. He

was yelling and went into the bathroom and tore apart the shower

doors and destroyed them. I was terrified and so was my daughter

Megan he was just out of control. And when his anger turned to

me, I was very afraid what he might do. Once he threatened to

push me out of a second story window. I was afraid, but I was also

terribly worried about him. I was afraid he was suffering from depression, but he refused to go to a doctor. He had sores on his

arms, on his neck, and on his face that had been there for at least

8 months, never getting any better.

I found the drugs and I drove around for hours, and I still didn’t

know what to do. I just went home and Jeff was waiting for me

there. He knew I had found them, and he wanted to talk to me

about it. At first he tried to just lightly dismiss it like it was no

big deal. He also told me that he was relieved that I had found out

his secret so he could quit lying to me and I could help him get

off of the drug. And so then the nightmare of trying to get him to

quit began.

During the next few months I helped him through withdrawal 4

times, and each time it was just awful. He made promises to me

and he convinced me that he would be a new man, and every time

he went back to meth. I wanted him to go to treatment and get

help, but he refused; he thought he could quit on his own. He

couldn’t.

With his life being such a chaotic mess he hardly went to work

anymore and his business failed. I started a part-time job just at

the first of the summer because we couldn’t seem to make ends

meet anymore. Later I found out he was spending between a

$1,000 and $2,000 a month to buy meth.

In October I realized that by my keeping his drug use a secret

that I was part of the problem and I needed help dealing with it

as well. So I told his family and my family and I told my bishop.

He was very angry at me for letting people know that he was using

drugs. I begged him to get treatment still, and his family and our

church helped to offer to pay for the treatment, and still he refused, still thinking that he could get over it on his own.

So I left him. I took my daughter and I went to my parents and

I told him I wanted a divorce. He convinced me he had stopped

again and asked me for another chance, so I went back to him.

This was in December. I’m sorry.

Chairman HATCH. That’s OK.

Ms. HOUSTON. Things were much better for a while, a couple

weeks. I found out he was using again on Christmas Eve. He had

been spending an awful lot of time in his garage. He told me he

was working on his truck, but it didn’t feel right. And I went out

one day when he was gone. I crawled up into the attic in the garage, and up there I found a meth lab.

I immediately packed my bags and took Megan and we went to

my parents house. I called my brother, who was a police officer, he

87

came over and I told him and my parents what I had found. We

called the Drug Task Force and two officers came over to the

house.

I knew that Jeff would hate me for having him arrested, and I

knew that it was probably the end of my marriage, but I loved him

and I wanted him to stop, and I knew that this was the only way.

I described to the police what I had found and I gave them permission to search the house. Officer Randall asked me if my daughter or I had been sick lately, and I told her we had both had severe

headaches the last couple months. He told me it was probably

caused by the chemicals used in making meth.

Jeff was arrested that afternoon and the Drug Task Force

cleaned up the lab. I wasn’t allowed to go back home until the

Health Department said it was OK. When I did go back home, I

found yellow police tape around my house and the quarantine sign

on the garage. The whole neighborhood had watched. It was front

page in the newspaper. I was embarrassed. And even though I had

done nothing wrong, I was ashamed.

The whole point in having Jeff arrested was to get him into rehabilitation. He needed a wake-up call to realize that he was destroying his life and he was losing everything that was important to him

because of meth. When he was using, meth was the only thing that

mattered to him. It consumed every minute of the day, when he

could take another hit, how long his supply would last, when he

could get some more, how would he pay for it, what if I found out.

It was all he cared about. He was out of control. I was afraid he

would die from it.

Like when you throw a rock into water, the ripples go far and

the rippling effects of meth are just as far-reaching.

Jeff once told me that it was his choice to use meth and that it

was his body and it only affected him, but he has hurt so many

people. First of all myself and our daughter Megan. I think of the

terrible way he treated us. I cry when I think about what my little

girl has gone through. When I married him it was for eternity, and

now our family is broken.

Megan and I had to move out of our home because we were left

with nothing. We had to sell most of our things, and now we live

with my parents. Megan has lost her daddy for a while and she has

also to deal with a mom who works full time now.

Besides the financial hardship, I’ve had to go—I’m going through

the pains of divorce and the very real struggles of being a single

mom. Jeff’s parents, my parents, our brothers and sisters, they’re

all heartbroken and hurt. My brother worked for Jeff, he believed

he had a future with the Internet company, he bought a house, his

wife had just had a baby, and then suddenly he had no job. The

men who invested a great deal of money into the business they lost

everything. My neighbors felt very hurt and betrayed and scared

that their very lives were in danger by the meth lab.

When I bump into friends they often ask me how could someone

as smart as Jeff could do something so stupid. I don’t know the answer to that. He seemed to have everything, his family, a successful business, and good friends, and meth took all of that away from

him.

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Jeff spent 132 days in jail. He entered a treatment program in

Salt Lake City last Friday. When he has completed the program he

still has to face sentencing and probably more jail time. I hope that

he can recover from meth. I love Jeff and I want him to get better,

but the odds are against him. As an addict he will have to battle

meth every day for the rest of his life, and his family and the people who love him have to deal with the consequences of being a victim of his meth use.

Chairman HATCH. I wish everybody in the country could have

heard your story because it’s typical of so many people that have

had their lives ruined. And applaud you for being able to pick up

and go on.

Ms. HOUSTON. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Houston follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT JANA HOUSTON

Last June, I was picking up my husband’s clothes. His socks were stuffed into his

shoes. I pulled the socks out and found a lighter, a glass pipe, and a container of

white crystals. I was stunned. I left the house, got in my car and just drove around

for several hours. I cried. I was angry. I was hurt. But as shocked as I was, it also

was like a puzzle that had finally fit together. Even though I had just found the

drugs that day, I had been feeling the effects of methamphetamine for a long time.

Jeff’s behavior and his whole personality had changed over the past few years.

Jeff owned his own business, an Internet company, so he often worked at night.

Putting in a 12-hour day was not unusual. But, he began spending 3 or 4 days at

the office with no sleep. Then he would come home and crash and sleep for 2 days

straight. It scared me when he was like that. I couldn’t wake him up. He said he

just had so much to do. He hardly ate anymore. He had lost 20 pounds. And he

was just plain mean sometimes. He had never been like that before.

He would get so angry over the smallest thing. For instance, one morning when

he got out of bed, he stumbled over his shoes that he had left there, and he flew

into a rage! Yelling, he grabbed the lamp on the nightstand and flung it across the

room, breaking it. Still making an awful noise he went into the bathroom and completely destroyed the shower doors. I was terrified and so was my daughter, Megan.

He would go crazy like this every week or two. I was scared of him. When his anger

was directed at me, I was afraid of what he would do. He seemed so out of control.

Once he threatened to throw me out the second-story window. Besides being scared,

I was terribly worried about him. I thought he was suffering from depression, but

he refused to see a doctor. His mom finally convinced him to go to the doctor about

the sores he had all over his arms, neck and face. They had been there for 8 months,

never getting any better.

After driving around for hours, I didn’t know what else to do, so I finally just

went home. Jeff was waiting for me. He knew I had found the drugs. He tried to

explain it away—he was a master at rationalizing. He said he was relieved that I

finally knew his secret, and he could quit lying to me, and I could help him get off

of meth. He convinced me that he wanted to quit, so then the nightmare of trying

to help him quit began.

Over the next few months, I helped him through withdrawal 4 times. It was horrible. But he made promises and convinced me that he would be a new man. And

every time he went back to meth. I begged him to go to a rehabilitation program,

but he was sure he could kick it on his own. He couldn’t.

With his life being so chaotic, he hardly ever worked anymore. His business failed.

I had started a part time job at the first of summer because we just couldn’t seem

to make ends meet anymore. I later found out he was spending $1000 to $2000 a

month on meth.

In October I realized that by my keeping his drug use a secret, I was part of the

problem. And I needed help dealing with it as well. So I told my family, his family

and my bishop. I wanted him to get help. But he still refused treatment. So I took

my daughter and left him—telling him I wanted a divorce. Over the next month he

convinced me he had stopped, and he asked for one last chance.

I gave him another chance, and went back in December. Things were much better—for a while. On Christmas Eve I found out he was using again.

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He had been spending most of his time in the garage—supposedly working on his

truck. But something wasn’t right, and on December 28, 1999, I climbed up in the

attic over the garage and found a meth lab.

I packed my bags, and Megan and I went to my parents. I called my brother who

is a police officer. I told him and my parents what I had found. We called the drug

task force and two officers came over. I knew that Jeff would probably hate me for

having him arrested, and it was probably the end of my marriage, but I loved him

and knew that this was the only way to get him to stop.

I described to the police what I had found and gave them permission to search

the house. Officer Randall asked if my daughter or I had been sick lately. I told

her that both of us had been experiencing severe headaches the past few months.

She said the headaches were probably caused from the chemicals. She advised us

to see a doctor because the chemicals used in making meth can cause serious health

problems.

Jeff was arrested that afternoon and the Drug Task Force cleaned up the lab. I

wasn’t able to go back to my house until the health department said it was ok.

When I went back home, I found yellow police tape around my house and a quarantine notice on the garage. The whole neighborhood had watched, and it was front

page in the newspaper. I was embarrassed. Even though I had done nothing wrong,

I felt ashamed.

The whole point of having Jeff arrested was to get him into rehabilitation. He

needed a wake up call to realize that he was an addict and he couldn’t quit on his

own. He had destroyed his life and lost all that was important to him because of

meth. While he was using, the only thing that mattered to him was getting high.

Meth consumed every minute of his day—when he could take another hit, how long

his supply would last, when he could get some more, how he was going to pay for

it, what if I found out. He was out of control, and I was afraid he would die from

it.

Like a stone thrown into water, the rippling effects of meth are far reaching. Jeff

once told me it was his choice, his body and he could do whatever he wanted to

it. He believed it only affected himself, but he has hurt so many people. First of

all what he’s done to Megan and myself—I think of the horrible way he acted toward us. I cry when I think of what my little girl has gone through. When I married

him, it was for eternity. Now because of meth our family is broken. Megan and I

moved out of our home, had to sell most of our things and move in with my parents.

Megan has lost her daddy for a while, and she also has to adjust to having her mom

work full time.

Besides the financial hardships, I am going through the pain of divorce and the

struggles of being a single mom. Jeff’s parents and my parents are heartbroken. His

brothers and sisters as well as my brothers and sisters feel hurt and betrayed. My

brother worked for Jeff. He believed he had a future with the company. He bought

a house; his wife had just had a baby. Then suddenly he had no job. The men who

had invested a great deal of money into Jeff’s business lost it all. Our neighbors felt

betrayed to find out their very lives were in danger living next to a meth lab. When

I bump into friends they always ask me, ‘‘How could someone as smart as Jeff do

something so stupid?’’ I don’t know the answer to that. He had everything: a wonderful family, a successful business, good friends, and meth destroyed it all.

Jeff spent 132 days in jail. He entered a treatment program in Salt Lake city last

Friday. When he has completed the program, he still has to face sentencing and possibly more jail time. I hope he can recover from meth. I love Jeff and want him to

get better, but the odds are against him. As an addict, he will have to battle meth

everyday for the rest of his life.

Chairman HATCH. We’re very grateful for your testimony.

We’re going to turn to you, Bradley, and I think your testimony

is going to be like that. Can we get a mic over there?

STATEMENT OF BRADLEY DAVIS

Mr. DAVIS. Hello, I’m Brad Davis. I would like to say it’s a privilege to be here. I would like to thank my family for being here.

I’ll tell you a little story how it came on me. I’m 43 years old

now. I’ve spent 4 years in prison because of drugs. I feel it all started with my friends who I was running around with when I was

younger, started with tobacco, alcohol in grade school. By the time

I got to eighth grade I was smoking marijuana. By the time I

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reached high school I got into speed, downers, PCP, cross tops. I

did LSD by the time I was in high school. I did all kind of

hallucinogenics.

When I got out of high school I kept on partying. I did get busted

a few times. But seriously nothing ever happened, really.

And then I started stealing anything I could to get drugs. I was

stealing pills from my mom and dad, stealing pills from my

grandpa. It was just a never ending thing to get the drugs, any

kind of drugs at the time.

And then I ended up getting married when I was 23 years old.

I was married for 11 years, had four wonderful children. But the

drugs were still in my life. I still smoked marijuana, doing speed.

I wasn’t really into the methamphetamine that much; I was using

cross tops. Went into cocaine, marijuana a lot, and alcohol.

And, like I say, I was married for 11 years. I ended up getting

divorced because of drugs and alcohol.

And then about 6 years ago, July 3, I lost my son in a car accident; he got hit in an auto accident. I kind of blame myself because

I was on drugs at the time. I know it was an accident, but I still

blame myself for it because I know—I don’t know if I could have

done anything wrong, but I know I was on drugs.

At the time I was doing methamphetamine, then like the lady

said methamphetamine that’s my whole—it was my whole life.

Then I met a Mexican, illegal Mexican, where what I was doing

was selling drugs, and he started bringing me in a pound to 2

pounds of meth a week, 3 to 4 pounds a week. And it was an ongoing thing. I was supplying all of Cedar mainly. Cedar, St. George,

all of Southern Utah. And I finally ended up getting busted.

Like I say, I didn’t really care about life that much anymore. I

started using more and more drugs. I was using about an eight ball

a day, which was probably $200, $250 a day habit.

I went to prison. Well, I got out—first I got busted here in Cedar

and I got out, did 30 days and got out. And them 30 days was some

of the toughest days of my life because I was so strung out on meth

then and being in jail without it, it was hard for me. I was 3 or

4 days I didn’t even get out of bed, you know.

And then I got out and got right back with my friends, old

friends again, old playmates and playground, and I was out 2

weeks out of jail and I got busted in St. George for methamphetamine again, half a pound of weed, marijuana. I did another 30,

40 days of jail down there and I finally got bailed out. Got right

back out, got right back into with old friends again, and stuff ended

up getting worse.

Three months later after the first time I got busted, I got busted

again up in Vernal for methamphetamine and stuff again, another

ounce of methamphetamine.

To make a long story short, I ended up getting convicted. I did

2 years in prison then for possession with intent, cocaine, marijuana and heroin—I mean, not heroin, but methamphetamine. And

I got out, was doing pretty good at the time, but I thought I could

use it again. I thought I could do a little bit again. I got with some

old friends again. That first time I was right back into it again. I

was hooked again. It didn’t—it didn’t take no time at all.

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I couldn’t really afford it at the time and I didn’t have that much

money, I was working—you know, money was tough. I run into a

friend showed me how to make it. It was a lot easier for me to

make it and do it, and then, you know, some of the friends I made

it for and they ended up wanting it, and I got right back in. I was

full board again.

And I had only been out of prison for about a year is all, and I

ended up getting busted again for manufacturing. And now I’m

doing 2 years. I’ll go back to the board of pardons in November. I’ll

have 2 years then.

Chairman HATCH. You’ve been through this. What advice would

you give to our young people who are tempted to use methamphetamine? What would you tell our young people?

Mr. DAVIS. It’s not on the right road. To me I think a lot to do

with the friends, your acquaintances. I mean, I take responsibility

for what I have done. I’ve hurt a lot of people. I’ve hurt—like she

said, a ripple, you know. It hasn’t hurt me, it’s hurt my family. It’s

hurt my kids. It’s hurt people I have sold to down the line.

I really think it’s the family. I mean, family and friends, if you

can keep them away from them, if you’re going to do it. That’s up

to you. I really believe it’s friends.

Chairman HATCH. And you’re in jail for another 2 years?

Mr. DAVIS. I get out—well, I go to the board in November. This

November.

Chairman HATCH. Are you getting any rehabilitation while you’re

in prison?

Mr. DAVIS. That’s another thing I would like to talk about.

Where I’m at now, I’m in St. George Purgatory Facility. They really

have no correctional facility for substance abuse. I’ve taken life

skills three times now. That’s the only class I’ve got that they’ve

got there.

What I would like to see is since I’ve been in prison and in and

out now, I would like to see like a jail for nothing but drug offenders where we can get help. There was one substance abuse class

in St. George that lasted a couple months and the lady quit. She’s

a voluntary lady, she was really good, but she quit. And there

hasn’t been no substance abuse nothing in there for now. I think

there should be like some kind of a jail where they have—down

there right now it’s sex offenders and they have therapy, and anything like that, but they have nothing for drug offenders.

You know, I’m going to get out some time and I would like to

have some kind of a trade, you know. I do heavy equipment, but

I would like to have maybe some fall back on electrician, plumbing,

anything, because when I get out, you know, times get tough, I

hate to say it but who knows as time gets tough, I need money,

I don’t want to fall back and have to make drugs and do drugs

again. I know I can make money there. It’s a bad thing. That’s why

I would like to see maybe a trade or get some kind of other trade,

or something, while I’m in prison. I think there should be something to look at there, you know.

Chairman HATCH. Well, you told the story, it’s a pretty sad story,

abusing story. And you got my money working on what we can do

to help. There’s got to be some way to help people who really want

to get out of this thing.

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I would like to say, in addition, welcome to Alan Gardner, Washington County Commissioner, and H.C. Deutschlander, Mayor of

Brian Head. We’re happy to have them here as well.

Let me just ask a couple of questions. Excuse me, I can’t tell you

how much we appreciate your testimony here today, your willingness to share the stories of your family’s tragedy. And you’ve been

one of the most articulate witnesses I’ve had.

Ms. HOUSTON. Thank you.

Chairman HATCH. And I’ve seen thousands of thousands of witnesses in my years in the Senate. I applaud your courage and welcome your courage to recognize the signs of drug use and addiction.

In your opinion, what are some of these telltale signs that family

members should be on the lookout for ?

Ms. HOUSTON. Well, in retrospect I feel a little stupid for not recognizing them sooner. But I really wasn’t aware that those were

the signs of meth. First of all, the way he would go through days

without sleep, I think that that’s some—a very common symptom,

and it’s one that is easily noticeable. He really would stay awake

3 or 4 days, and then he would have to sleep for a long time.

Second is the sores. Often people who do meth will pick at their

skin because they think there’s imaginary bugs there. It’s just one

of the symptoms. And like I told you, he had sores up his arms and

they spread to his face and neck. And they never went away. And

even now he has scars left because they were such bad sores.

I think that those are two symptoms that people could look at

and really question if there was drug use going on.

Chairman HATCH. Ms. Harmon, is there any way you can tell

whether a person is on drugs by looking in their eyes?

Ms. HARMON. Well, pupils are dilated on some drugs and some

drugs constrict the eye. So I don’t think it’s a really good——

Chairman HATCH. Not a sure way?

Ms. HARMON. No.

Mr. DAVIS. I would like to say——

Chairman HATCH. Go ahead.

Mr. DAVIS [continuing]. Something. A lot of people don’t eat on

drugs. The nervousness, you can’t sit still that long, you got to be

doing something.

Chairman HATCH. Mr. Davis, what point in your life did you

know that drugs had taken effect and what, if anything, do you

think could have been done, or what, if anything, could have been

done to break this down on meth?

Mr. DAVIS. I was addicted right off the first thing. And drug addicts, such as myself, we won’t go get help. I wouldn’t. I had to be

forced to get into substance abuse some help.

You know, I could tell myself and stuff. When I was on probation

at first, I was really hoping they make me go through counseling,

some kind of a treatment program, because I wouldn’t—I wouldn’t

ever commit myself.

Chairman HATCH. Well, methamphetamine has many social

causes in addition to the cause of users and bringing dealers to justice. It ruins lives, it ruins families, property, as we just heard from

today’s witnesses.

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Let me just ask you this, you four women and leaders, from what

you have seen if you could describe more of the devastation that

comes from this particular drug. Ms. Milne.

Ms. MILNE. We have lived with our family we adopted a young

man and he has chosen the route of drugs, and it’s probably been

the reason that I have tried so hard in prevention. I believe we’ve

got to get to these young people at an early age with persistent,

consistent messages on antidrug use, because what happens is that

these youth, as Mr. Davis alluded to, it may be one, it may be several times that they have to use, but you don’t know who is the

addict.

This young man came from a family where both mom and dad

were addicts. We thought we could change all of that just by cleaning up and loving him, and you can’t. You can’t take away some

of those things. And it leaves its scars forever.

When you look at these children that are harmed, when they are

put in foster care and protected, can they function in school? Not

generally. Can they function in their social skills? Not generally.

So we’ve got to look at keeping it from happening, in my opinion,

if we’re really truly going to make a difference.

Chairman HATCH. Ms. Corry, do you have any comments on

that?

Ms. CORRY. Just one second. My husband and I were discussing

drugs the other day, and we have a nephew who’s a fetal alcohol

syndrome child, and I also have a nephew who’s a Downs child,

and we were contrasting the care that this Downs individual is getting in the schools and in the community, how well he’s accepted

and how people go out of their way to make him respectable and

feel like a useful member of the community, and yet this fetal alcohol person youth is shunned and has been in trouble with the law

and the courts because there’s no system where he needs to be in

a home. He needs to be in a situation where he’s under control all

the time.

And, you know, we have taken drugs and criminalized them and

not worked to help the individuals, because, you know, drugs a lot

of times they take over. I mean, they do. They take over who you

are, and you are no longer that individual. You have no control.

And to me it is very heart breaking to see that people that get on

drugs and cannot get off do not have any support, support against

society, to get them off and keep them under control to where they

are in control of their lives.

Chairman HATCH. Thank you.

Ms. Harmon.

Ms. HARMON. I think she’s right. There’s definitely the social

stigma that goes with some youth. Ms. Houston alluded to that

even though she wasn’t a substance abuser, she felt ashamed and

her neighbors shunned her.

I think that we as a society need to address that and accept that

when people begin using drugs they have a choice, but when that— eventually some place in that progression they lose their free choice

and it becomes an obsession. I’ve even heard people that I have

treated describe it as a possession, they no longer have free will.

They are possessed by their obsession to get drugs and they’ll do

anything to do that.

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Chairman HATCH. Mr. Davis has certainly indicated that’s the

case. Ms. Houston, where is your husband now? Is he—— Ms. HOUSTON. He’s in the treatment center in Salt Lake.

Chairman HATCH. Is he in jail?

Ms. HOUSTON. No, he was released from jail to go to treatment.

Chairman HATCH. So he’s voluntarily trying to at a house?

Ms. HOUSTON. Yes, sir. He wants to quit now.

Chairman HATCH. I see. Do you stay in contact with him now?

Ms. HOUSTON. I do. He calls me once a week or writes letters.

Chairman HATCH. I take it that he is a graduate from college?

Ms. HOUSTON. Yes, he is.

Chairman HATCH. And he’s skilled in computers?

Ms. HOUSTON. Yes, he is.

Chairman HATCH. And Internet type work?

Ms. HOUSTON. (Nods head.)

Chairman HATCH. He really has the world on the tail with this

addiction.

Ms. HOUSTON. He certainly does. And that is a part of the tragedy of his story and that he could have so much, and he did have

so much before he became a meth addict.

Chairman HATCH. There are some people, Mr. Davis, that think

that we ought to shoot the manufacturers of drugs influencing our

children. Would that help solve the problem?

Mr. DAVIS. Say that again.

Chairman HATCH. If you were threatened to be shot or executed,

do you think that would help stop the drugs?

Mr. DAVIS. In a way.

Chairman HATCH. You can see that question causes a lot of problems. I just wanted to hear your reaction.

Let’s say that there was a capital penalty, let’s say there was a

capital penalty for manufacturers of drugs, would that play a role

and would that help you give up the—— Mr. DAVIS. Well, yeah, maybe. If the money and the demand is

there, it’s something—somebody is going to be available and supplying it. As far as the chemicals you were talking about earlier,

getting rid of some of the chemicals, it seems like they try to get

rid of like some of the pseudoephedrine, and stuff. They tried to get

rid of the iodine crystals, and stuff like that. Cultured iodine, they

make their own iodine crystals. Now they’re trying to do it. Now

it’s lithium. It seems like somebody is going to find a way to do it

if the money is still there.

Chairman HATCH. I see. Just a question I wanted to ask you because some people I really feel that it’s just a scourge to our society.

Mr. DAVIS. It really is.

Chairman HATCH. It would be an element on those people. I’m

not sure, but I wanted to ask the question.

Ms. HARMON. Senator.

Chairman HATCH. Yes.

Ms. HARMON. Also when you are using drugs your thinking is diluted so you’re not thinking rationally. You believe that your 10

feet tall and bullet proof. And even though you’re doing something

illegal, you’re not likely to get caught.

Chairman HATCH. You don’t suffer the consequences.

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Ms. HARMON. And you believe you’re not going to get caught;

somebody else will get caught.

Chairman HATCH. The arguments of why we might do anything

about the—you know, the people who are already hooked, but it

might wake up everybody who is thinking of getting into it. And

I just—I would look at everything to find an answer, or some answer.

There’s no question we need to do more in prevention. That’s

something I’m getting from these hearings and that’s why we’re

holding hearings.

I just have to say, you know, the treatment on juvenile justice

bill that we worked so hard on in the Senate, there was really

nothing in there about guns. It was mainly—it was one of the few

times when both parties had more convention money than they had

law enforcement money, so there was plenty for both, and they succeeded in making it a gun bill and making it a politicized bill. I

can’t even bring up a conference because all it would lead to is a

bunch of political talk and screaming and shouting for political purposes.

But if we could pass that juvenile justice bill we would go a long

way of solving these problems, providing the money that is essential for these areas. And I’m really almost bitter that this has become a gun bill rather—hardly anything about guns. It’s all juvenile justice prevention and law enforcement. There’s a lot of information in here that deals with it and how to avoid this type of

things.

And I don’t think we’ll get anything through this Congress. But

I’m hopeful the start of the next session I’m hopeful people on both

sides who won’t politicize and get something done that will be in

the best interest of our children and people like all of you who

spend more of your time to help your society get by.

Well, I am very thankful of the people who spoke here today, it’s

been very meaningful for me, and I’m glad that we’ve had all of you

here.

You have a question back there.

PARTICIPANT. I would just like to share my testimony, if I could,

for just a minute.

Chairman HATCH. Why don’t you come up and do so.

PARTICIPANT. I wish not to disclose my name.

Chairman HATCH. You can pick up a microphone.

PARTICIPANT. I wish not to disclose my name to the area that I

live in, or the people that this circumstance happened under that

I would like to take you on a journey for our daughter that was

gang raped. She believed she had been raped by four people. She

went to four houses and couldn’t get help. The person at the fourth

house called, insisted that she be called. They took her in.

My concern is the recovery efforts of these young women when

they have been raped. I think it’s very, very important that when

somebody undergoes such tragedies that there is policies in place

and laws that they might get the assistance that they need. The

American Medical Association states very clearly to the doctors one

person comes under those circumstances that a person for administrative functions it costs that person in their lifetime three times

more than it does to support a man or a woman in prison for the

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rest of their life. Administrative fees include the procedures they

go through, mental health counseling.

I want to share what’s happened to our family who did not receive the assistance that should have been there, because I believe

rape isn’t something to be ashamed of, and I think our society in

Utah especially we have a very big concern. I was willing to talk

on campus to groups because I was in a communication class, I

sense my daughter went through the trauma and the tragedies

that we have for women I took to the health center. None of these

were required.

The statistics and the facts are not there. What’s happening in

our community is inaccurate, and it is not being properly accounted

for.

We are $7,000 in the hole. The promises made to my family that

if they were willing to sign papers the State would help cover medical expenses, that didn’t happen. We didn’t get help. We lost three

scholarships, lost our insurance, coverage for my daughter. She’s

not a full-time student. She can’t go to—she can’t have insurance

coverage. She couldn’t even function. She had freeze fright so bad.

She couldn’t function. She slept—did not sleep for near 8 months.

It caused discord in our family and pain we will never understand.

It can be proven medically what happened to her. She—and

nothing was ever mentioned that I heard drugs. Alcohol is one of

our bigger issues. We believe date rape drugs were used. She was

paralyzed. She had no voice, she had no speech. She couldn’t resist.

Eighteen years I taught and supported the young women, and

every year we have police officers and DARE officers come in and

tell our young how to prevent rape. They weren’t even talked to.

Where is our support? Four women on the campus that we did

get some assistance through the health department couldn’t go to

their parents because they would have been disowned, freshmen in

college. There’s no statistical accounting for that. All of the promises that Utah State gave and Federal aid did not exist.

Our family has been near destroyed. And all we wanted was a

protocol, a procedure that was lawfully and respectfully put in

place that one might survive rape, because the devastation one undergoes when you have to witness people standing taking turns

and you can’t do anything about it and then you see your family

maybe lose their home because nobody cared and nobody helped.

I think it’s appalling and we need the utmost care.

Who cares if they catch the bad guy at that point. First thing

should be medical priority. The drug she had been given by her

own doctor itself along with the medical—the alcohol she had taken

is a 100 percent provability that she had—that convulsions and all

the things that stated she had. Everything she said to those people

were true and factual and can be proved.

My concern is who cares? I hope you do. And I hope we can get

some changes in place that our women are no longer accused and

shamed and blamed because rape’s horrifying anyway. But to be

disowned, to have friends walk away from her, no longer want to

associate with the label with a rape victim is appalling to me. Took

near a year and a half for her to even get a job.

Chairman HATCH. Ma’am, I want to thank you for showing up,

and I’d like to urge you to contact my office here in Cedar City and

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we’ll follow-up with what’s happened, what we can do for your family.

Let me just finish today. I learned a lot here today, and I hope

everybody who came here learned as much as well.

Clearly, when we think about these things that could adversely

affect our young people’s health as well as their ability to learn and

to make good choices, drug abuse and the health and learning

problems that go with it rank high on the list.

Now, we’ve already seen the tragic ramifications of gang activity,

cocaine, crack, and other drugs. According to the experts we have

heard today, we can now add these so-called club drugs to the

growing list of threats to our kids.

I’m going to leave the record open for this hearing and for those

who want to make additional statements until July 21 for any additional questions for the members of Judiciary Committee, or for

additional statements from Utah’s elected officials, educational,

medical, or law enforcement. And I would like to invite all of you

to submit short statements as well, in writing if you will. I hope

to include a limited number in the hearing record. Such statements

may contribute a constructive suggestion for action, a personal experience, or additional facts concerning the perils facing Utah’s

youth.

I want to have a continual dialogue in these issues. I think it’s

essential that we do that. This is not a problem that can be solved

overnight. And I’ll do everything I can to try and resolve some of

these problems that have been brought up here today.

So with that we’ll recess until further notice. Thank you all for

coming.

[Whereupon, at 4:12 p.m., the committee adjourned.]

Æ