From: (Meth Time) Subject: Meth and Violence Date: 1995/09/05 newsgroups: alt.drugs.hard Sept. 5, 1995 Tucson, Arizona I am an ex-methamphetamine manufacturer from San Diego, California who is currently serving a 110-month sentence at a Federal Prison in Tucson, Arizona. I have been here for 87 months so far. According to the U.S. Attorney's office, I was the leader and organizer of an interstate methamphetamine manufacturing and distribution ring that literally produced hundreds of pounds of meth over a period of 7 years. I do not advocate the use of methamphetamine and I am not writing to justify my own actions, rather to state the "fact" to those that say, "..more violence is now attributed to the use of methamphetamine in recent years," has absolutely nothing to do with the drug being "new" or "more potent." This drug has been popular for more than 30 years, and the only "phenomenon" is that violence attributed to its use has been only in the past 2 or 3 years. In fact, the drugs are not as pure as they were just a few years ago. The DEA's forensics lab tested the methamphetamine from my particular lab to be 97.5% pure; you can't get much purer than that, yet little to no violence was connected to my product. We tracked our product and observed the behavior of the users, and as with any drug, there were adverse effects. However, violence was rare. The crystal gave the users unnatural energy and seemed to amplify the person's personality. For example, if the user was interested in mechanics, guitar playing or sex, he or she could wrench, play or fuck for days on end without losing interest. Stating this, I suppose if a user had underlying tendencies toward violence or child abuse, methamphetamine could manifest this type of behavior. But then again, so could alcohol. While manufacturing during the Œ80's, we discovered that subtle variations of certain formulas such as, chemical ratio, temperature, pressure, cooking time and different chemical combinations can have profound effects on the way the meth affects the user. On one occasion, a certain chemical necessary for a reaction I was doing was unavailable; another chemical with very similar properties was used in its place. The resulting product was clean and potent; it tested out almost pure. Word soon came back that although the users were pleased with the quality, some became aggressive and irritable. I immediately knew why and never repeated that particular substitution. Some time later, I slightly altered yet another process and came up with a drug that made the users unusually horny. It became known as the "come-fuck-me" dope; this product became more desired amongst the users. The only apparent side effects were "wet panties" and 12-hour erections. It was better having the users try to fuck each other to death than actually killing people. These two radically different forms of the same drug were achieved through slight variations of known formulas. An experienced "cook" can virtually play "God" with the user's mind. Although I have studied chemistry in college, I am not an organic chemist or chemical engineer so I don't know exactly why this occurs; I just know that it does. About a month ago, here in Arizona, a 30-something year old man pulled over on the freeway and decapitated his 14-year-old son. He threw the severed head out onto the highway then got back in his car and drove away. When he was captured a short time later, he stated that he had been awake for eight days while high on meth at the time of the killing. With the government's "War on Drugs", in the latter part of the Œ80's, a large percentage of the "cooks" who knew what they were doing were arrested. Others simply quit producing meth because of the new risk of the 20 years to life sentences that the Federal courts were handing out like candy. During this period, strict controls were placed on precursor chemicals such as, phenylacetic acid, L-ephedrine, hydriodic acid, diethyl ether, red phosphorous, palladium black and many others that were necessary to correctly manufacture crystal-meth. The demand for methamphetamine remains high but the availability of chemicals is gone. Inexperienced "cooks" are now at the helm using whatever chemicals they can get their hands on. New people who were involved in the manufacturing of methamphetamine are coming into the Federal prison system all the time and I can't believe some of the stories I've heard. Nowadays they're using things like pool acid, benzyl cyanide, Drain-O, cold pills, iodine, starting fluid, styrene, matchbook stickers and herbicides. I talked to one guy recently who had access to the proper chemicals but didn't know how to use them. He was leaving out an essential detoxification step; the drug he was producing was methamphetamine but it had to be at least slightly toxic. Meth in its purest form is bad enough but if people use these potentially poisonous forms for prolonged periods there is little doubt that their minds will be affected. As long as there is a demand for meth, there will be people out there trying to make it; the motivation is there. It costs approximately $200 per pound to make and sells for $6,000 to $10,000. A controlled substance that was rarely heard of just a few years ago is now, out of control. The more illegal any situation becomes, the more violent it becomes. Can our coprophagous government be held at least partially accountable for this lethal evolution of methamphetamine?