Meth And Crime Go Hand In Hand
mill...@intergate.com
Meth and crime go hand in hand
JACLYN O'MALLEY
RENO GAZETTE-JOURNAL
Posted: 6/24/2006
A three-month Reno Gazette-Journal investigation found that
methamphetamine's grip on the Truckee Meadows has become a
stranglehold.
Burglars, robbers, rapists, carjackers, identity thieves and murderers
-- criminals in the Truckee Meadows almost always have a meth
addiction.
"Most of these criminals are involved in meth," said Lt. Ron Donnelly
of Reno police. "Crime is the only way these cranksters make their
living. Their whole life is built around using and getting meth, which
is what drives them to crime.
"If meth were gone, the crime rate would totally drop. An incredible
amount of crime is attributable to meth."
The exact number of meth-related crimes is unknown, because arrest
charges do not always record an addiction. But anecdotaly, police say
the rise in crime is related because suspects are caught with meth and
its paraphernalia and later confess that they turned to crime to
support their habit.
Meth-related crime in Reno has ranged from an elderly couple murdered
by their 55-year-old son in 2004, their bludgeoned bodies left in the
garage, to a 19-year-old raping and terrorizing women in their homes
near the University of Nevada, Reno in 2005. Last year, a 24-year-old
man shot a Reno police officer in the face because he didn't want to go
to jail for driving a stolen pickup.
In 2000, Carson City Justice of the Peace John Tatro called the death
of a 79-year-old woman "the poster child of the horrible effects of
methamphetamine."
Iris Barton's decomposed body was found in her bedroom about two months
after she died. Her meth-addicted live-in caregiver, Kelly Hein, was
charged with murder but later pleaded guilty to neglect and
exploitation of an elderly person. She had spent more than $38,000 of
Barton's money. Hein, 39, remains on parole.
A career criminal and convicted meth trafficker was spared prison in
2001 after he convinced a Washoe district judge he was tired of games,
gangs and drugs. Three years later he would commit what authorities
called the most heinous crime in Madera County, Calif.,'s history.
Patrick Joseph Booth, violently high on meth, invaded the home of
Darren and Chastity Baker, beat Darren Baker with a baseball bat and
trapped the couple in their bathroom for nearly 24 hours. He forcibly
injected meth into their 11-year-old son. He looted the Bakers' home
and stole their vehicle.
Booth, 36, was arrested in a Reno motel room. He is now in Nevada
prison serving the remaining term of his suspended sentence for
burglary and possessing stolen property. For the Madera invasion, he
got life sentences.
"Meth is an epidemic but it's no excuse for what he did to us," Darren
Baker said. "People who are on meth are sick. It's a sick drug and
makes you do sick things. What kind of a person would inject meth into
a little boy when he has children of his own?"
Baker said the incident caused his family to move from their home and
to be more suspicious of people.
"I had lived in that house for four years and left the windows open and
unlocked," he said. "There was never any crime where we lived and then
all of a sudden, wham, out of the blue we were attacked."
"He could have robbed us and got out, but he didn't," he said. "Meth
made him do all that crazy stuff."
What disturbs Baker is that he still has no reason why Booth invaded
his home and attacked his family.
"You do brutal stuff on meth," he said. "I feel sorry for those
people."
Brandon Douglas Allen was high on meth when he fired a single shot into
the back of his girlfrield's back in 1999 in Sun Valley.
His lawyer, John Oakes, said Allen never meant to kill Kellie Parry.
"He was under the influence of drugs, and he was screwing around with a
gun, and she got shot," Oakes said at the time. "An accident is an
accident."
Allen is serving two life terms for the death.
Washoe Drug Court Judge Peter Breen said many of the meth addicts in
his court are jobless, feeding their habit by selling drugs and
committing crimes.
"A meth addict who's good for 25 crimes and then suddenly stops and
gets a job is what we want," Breen said.
Washoe Family Court Judge Francis Doherty said during a press
conference announcing the Meth Commnity Response Alliance group that
meth is a drug of violence.
"It creates unplanned and unmeditated violence," she said. "It's
frightening to digest. It's a drug of crimes, always with an underlying
criminal component that's evident in our jails and in the lives of our
citizens."
Addicts turn to crime
Addicts say meth made them turn to crime to support their habit.
"I couldn't work and meth controlled my entire life," said Tim Wakeman,
a 40-year-old felon who kicked his meth habit in 1998.
Wakeman recalled that evening in 1998 when he decided he'd had enough.
He was at a friend's home using meth, and noticed a woman next to him
had wrapped her baby in newspaper without a diaper. So they went out in
his truck to steal metal to sell at a recycling plant, a method to get
money addicts call scrapping. They got caught and social workers took
the woman's baby away.
"She was screaming and yelling that her baby was taken away and I was
already facing prison time before this ... that was the last day I used
meth," Wakeman said. "Being popped (arrested) again and hearing that
woman screaming was the breaking point."
Wakeman now owns his own business and cherishes being a good father to
his 6-year-old son. But behind him are four divorces, four drunken
driving convictions and fraud and burglary felonies. He has two teen
daughters he barely knows.
He said the residential treatment program at Northstar treatment center
in Reno convinced him to be clean and sober.
"I spent half my life in the bathroom doing drugs and the other half
stealing to try to get it," said Wakeman, who organizes recovery
meetings at Northstar.
"I've seen babies trying to crawl on kitchen floors covered in vomit,
slipping all over the place while their mom was in the bathroom poking
their bodies and mutilating their faces before I ever reached my
breaking point."
"Today I can't even imagine the life I lived," he said. "We hurt
people, we lie and steal from people ... we're just meth zombies. Meth
addiction is an epidemic and it's raising crime levels and ruining
lives."
goodbye
<mill...@intergate.com> wrote in message
news:1151357316.7...@r2g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
> http://news.rgj.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060624/NEWS/606250326
>
> Meth and crime go hand in hand
> JACLYN O'MALLEY
> RENO GAZETTE-JOURNAL
> Posted: 6/24/2006
> A three-month Reno Gazette-Journal investigation found that
> methamphetamine's grip on the Truckee Meadows has become a
> stranglehold.
>
>
> Burglars, robbers, rapists, carjackers, identity thieves and murderers
> -- criminals in the Truckee Meadows almost always have a meth
> addiction.
>
They force prohibition on everyone, then wonder why it gets out of control
when people have to make their own.
I got a novel approach, prescribe "speed" to addicts in the same was as they
prescribe methadone to people with an opiate addiction.
If pure pharmaceutical speed was available, nobody would bother making their
own.
TwistyCreek
Yeah that would really work. Look at all the thieves, cheats,
scammers and scumbags on alt.drugs.hard who are on methadone for
their opiate addictions. Helped you people out a lot. You for
starters. Go look for a job deadbeat and stop preaching. You
have as much power and ability to change society as a fly
sitting on a turd.
Ermac77
You raise a good point, although the problem is that speed is more
ruinous than alcohol (tough to beat booze but speed does it..)
People will use pharmaceutical speed to tweak, and that's very
damaging to your health.
It's not the way methadone is--methadone provides the backdrop without
much high (so I would assume for recovering heroin users), and it's
not a damaging drug except for OD potential.
Although I certainly wish your suggestion could come true... I'm a
former amphetamine-addict myself (Dexedrine, not crystal) and there's
a possiblity your suggestion could work, if the scripts are under
intense scrutiny..
Just as easy to tweak on Adderall/Dexedrine as it is on meth.
rangi123
mutation of) which humans were vulnerable to. Then the said fly craps
on your lunch and you get the virus. Then at work you sneeze and give
the said virus to half a dozen co-workers. Tamiflu don't work. More
people get sick, half the world dies. LOL. Now that fly sure did have
some ability to change society.
DopeyOpie8
"goodbye" <b...@bye.com> wrote in message
news:8x3og.17161$ap3....@news-server.bigpond.net.au...
I don't know...Having used pretty much every drug out there, I can't see
"speed maintenance" or "cocaine maintenance" working like "methadone
maintenance" does...I mean, it's not that difficult to reach a maintenance
level with an opiate drug..What possible amount of coke/speed would ever be
"enough" for somebody addicted? When I was doing coke, I'd do however much I
could get my hands on..And is "legal" speed any less likely to cause
paranoia and suspicion?
I believe opiates are disitnctly different from the other "powder" drugs...
Mike
freek
was i believe. Its already quite some years ago, but what i remember from it
that you could get every drug there like speed and coke and heroin and
methadone and more, but you could only get speed three times a week and i
believe coke everyday same with heroin and methadone, but i think this thing
failed, because of its own succes.
Now its already that far that coke maintenance is given in Holland and then
you are right by stating that you want to do as much coke as there is
availeble, but if you get say a gram well then atleast a part of your habit
is filled, but i have really no idea what is given in a coke maintenance
program.
For speed it seems unlikely to me that people want more more more, because
once wired why become even more strung out then it does not feel good
anymore so i think speedmaintenance is possible, but for coke really a limit
has to be set.
In the heroin programs in Holland you can get a gram a day, but only a few
from the addicts who can get that gram will take that gram most of them have
enough with 600 mg's so two 300 mg shots a day and methadone maintenance
well what to say more about that it works.
Regards, Freek.
"DopeyOpie8" <bria...@aol.com> schreef in bericht
news:WP6og.16361$Z67....@tornado.socal.rr.com...
DopeyOpie8
"freek" <freek...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:44a116b9$0$8996$e4fe...@dreader28.news.xs4all.nl...
> HI Mike, have you ever heard about that experiment they did in Liverpool
> it was i believe. Its already quite some years ago, but what i remember
> from it that you could get every drug there like speed and coke and heroin
> and methadone and more, but you could only get speed three times a week
> and i believe coke everyday same with heroin and methadone, but i think
> this thing failed, because of its own succes.
> Now its already that far that coke maintenance is given in Holland and
> then you are right by stating that you want to do as much coke as there is
> availeble, but if you get say a gram well then atleast a part of your
> habit is filled, but i have really no idea what is given in a coke
> maintenance program.
> For speed it seems unlikely to me that people want more more more, because
> once wired why become even more strung out then it does not feel good
> anymore so i think speedmaintenance is possible, but for coke really a
> limit has to be set.
> In the heroin programs in Holland you can get a gram a day, but only a few
> from the addicts who can get that gram will take that gram most of them
> have enough with 600 mg's so two 300 mg shots a day and methadone
> maintenance well what to say more about that it works.
> Regards, Freek.
Yeah, between the two, I'm guessing that "speed maint" has a better shot
than "coke maint"..But like I said, regardless of whether it's pharm or
street stuff, (often the same, anyway) a person simply cannot take speed
every day without suffering drastic side effects...I mean, probably the only
reason some speed addicts are still alive is because they ran out of money,
got arrested, or couldn't get hold of the drug...I've asked this question
before...and while my heart is with the addicts, I just can't see a person
using coke or speed every single day without killing themselves. Unlike
opiates/methadone...a person can be on opiates for 50 years with few
negative effects..Unless a "speed/coke maint" allows people to drop in just
when they want to party a bit...like once every couple of weeks..lol!
Mike
Abraxus
I agree, otherwise I just picture a long line of people waiting for
their "Cocaine Maintence" dose and as soon as they get it, hit it up
real quick and then go to the back of the line again. There would be
people all tweaked out at the front desk begging for just one more
shot. It would be mayhem at the coke maintence clinic. Some would
probably get 2 weeks worth of takehomes and run through them in a few
hours, and be back at the clinic in the morning. I can't see any way
that cocaine maintenence would work. Speed maintenence would bew a
little better, but it still wouldn't be feasible IMO. If people got
their speed everyday, when would they go crash. They would just end up
staying awake indefinately. Anytime I have done speed, I was up until
I ran out. The only way I could see this ssort of thing working is if
they administered some form of long-acting oral stimulant that reduced
cravings and inhibited the action of subsequently administered speed or
coke. I don't think there is such a drug in existence, but I could be
wrong.
DopeyOpie8
"Abraxus" <tc...@hush.com> wrote in message
news:1151444991.2...@i40g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
I remember seeing a "LIFE" magazine article years ago, about the Brits
prescribing heroin and coke for addicts. They showed an all night pharmacy,
with a line of people outside waiting for the clock to hit "12:01" (One
minute after midnight) It was then, the "next day" and they could all get
their scripts filled, the ones dated for "that" day...
Mike
Ermac77
>they administered some form of long-acting oral stimulant that reduced
>cravings and inhibited the action of subsequently administered speed or
>coke. I don't think there is such a drug in existence, but I could be
>wrong.
That drug exists, and in two formats:
1) Bupropion (or Wellbutrin--abuse it and you get seizures, so there's
your blocker)
2) Modafinil (provides the wakefulness backdrop, mild high, but abuse
causes discomfort)
There you go.
ravnetard
It's like something alien I just can't comprehend. I can relate or at
least empathize with stories of addicts of every other variety. But
speed is a particular breed of drug that has no place in society in my
opinion. There just seems to be this element of antisocial behavior
that walks hand in hand with the addiction. If speed was legalized, I
firmly believe that the same antisocial and disturbing behavior would
remain.
I thought the concept of happy, productive, well-adjusted tweakers was
impossible in the strictest sense of the idea since active meth users
exhibit this paranoid schizo-affective behavior naturally...I can't see
myself enjoying living and working among self-chosen "schizophrenics",
not to mention living in a society in which we legalize and condone the
cause of the schizo behavior...
Please, somebody convince me otherwise. Would tweakers lead happy,
productive lives if speed was legalized?
John Graeme
> Call me biased, but these stories of tweakers always turn my stomach.
> It's like something alien I just can't comprehend. I can relate or at
> least empathize with stories of addicts of every other variety. But
> speed is a particular breed of drug that has no place in society in my
> opinion. There just seems to be this element of antisocial behavior
> that walks hand in hand with the addiction. If speed was legalized, I
> firmly believe that the same antisocial and disturbing behavior would
> remain.
> Please, somebody convince me otherwise. Would tweakers lead happy,
> productive lives if speed was legalized?
At least they wouldn't be involved in so much crime if it were legal.
Nearly all the crap you hear about crime and amphetamines is like most
of the other distortions or hyperbole about drugs--It's based on
anecdotes, it confuses correlations with cause and effect, it ignores
the effects of the illegality.
DopeyOpie8
"ravnetard" <tomand...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1151463351.0...@b68g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
> Call me biased, but these stories of tweakers always turn my stomach.
> It's like something alien I just can't comprehend. I can relate or at
> least empathize with stories of addicts of every other variety. But
> speed is a particular breed of drug that has no place in society in my
> opinion. There just seems to be this element of antisocial behavior
> that walks hand in hand with the addiction. If speed was legalized, I
> firmly believe that the same antisocial and disturbing behavior would
> remain.
>
> I thought the concept of happy, productive, well-adjusted tweakers was
> impossible in the strictest sense of the idea since active meth users
> exhibit this paranoid schizo-affective behavior naturally...I can't see
> myself enjoying living and working among self-chosen "schizophrenics",
> not to mention living in a society in which we legalize and condone the
> cause of the schizo behavior...
>
> Please, somebody convince me otherwise. Would tweakers lead happy,
> productive lives if speed was legalized?
That's what I'm saying...If the powers that be are gonna allow certain drugs
to become legal, as they have to a certain extent with methadone, it has to
be a drug that can be demonstrated to be beneficial, that an addict actually
lives a better, more productive and satisfied life with it, than without it.
Every drug has it's dark side, it's negative side effects...but people
stabilized on methadone (or morphine, or even oxy..any opiate) can pretty
much lead a life without thought of addiction, one that only the closest
observer would notice anything 'different". (immediate family members) In
the cases where opiates have been prescribed for pain, the result would be
overwhelmingly positive...and even when they're prescribed simply to
maintain an addiction, once certain people get over their notion that "he's
gotta quit drugs..that's the only way", an objective observer would have to
admit there's improvement.
But the same just can't be said for speed or coke. I realize there are
certain conditions for which a limited dose of amphetamine/methadrine is the
proper response..But if we're talking about a strictly "maintenance" type
supply...I cannot imagine anybody improving in any area of their life taking
a daily dose of either drug..
Mike
Ganjette
>
>
>They force prohibition on everyone, then wonder why it gets out of control
>when people have to make their own.
>
>I got a novel approach, prescribe "speed" to addicts in the same was as they
>prescribe methadone to people with an opiate addiction.
>If pure pharmaceutical speed was available, nobody would bother making their
>own.
Methamphetamines are the inevitable by-product of the "war on drugs."
It's a cheap high and its manufacture/distribution doesn't require all
the costs and complications associated with smuggling and it
eliminates a whole string of "middlemen." The harder it becomes to get
other hard drugs, the more popular the homemade stuff is going to be.
DeQuincey
heroin and cocaine, however, the article concentrated much more on the
heroin as it contrasted with methadone treatment, etc. Psychiatrists
and GP's prescribed (and still do althoughit is much rarer) speed
widely throughought the 50's and 60's for a broad range of ailments,
but the doses were, I suspect, much lower than the average speed-freak
would consider a "maintenance" dose. All that being said, I cannot
imagine stimulant maintenance being beneficial to either society or the
stimulant addict. The former having to deal with the anti-social
behaviors of stimulant users and the latter being burdened with the
long-term physical and psychological side-effects of chronic speed and
cocaine use. On the hand, though, society puts up with all of those
things w/ alchohol and its users.
I think Mike is right when he says there is something inherently
different to opiates from other "hard" drugs that makes them better
suited for long-term doctor prescribed use.
Bill
> Please, somebody convince me otherwise. Would tweakers lead happy,
> productive lives if speed was legalized?
>
>
of society. are they happy? perhaps not but then out of the people
I know who are not tweakers, I'd estimate 60% of them are not happy
either, so I can't see happiness as a valid marker when speaking of
tweakers. moderation is the key. and for the most part a speed habit
can still be had in a legal way so I find myself against the street
meth mostly because it is impossible to have controls on quality.
Chip Flintknapper
They preach abstinence, which is not a solution for addicts. The people
behind the drug war are not very smart people, and it is never going to
do you any good to try and reason with them.
Let's play a game called "If I were the President". The first thing that
I would do is transfer all drug enforcement away from the Attorneys
General and give it to the Surgeons General. Yes, doctors can be as bad
as the Fascists at times, but at least they are trained and use the
proper terminology.
Amphetamines were originally prescribed as "diet pills" back in the
60's, just as Valium was every mothers helper (remember the song by the
Rolling Stones). It came and went and we should have learned, just like
we did with thalidomide, that it wasn't any good.
But the rotten doth persist, with the assistance of the folks making the
money off of your downfall. Grow pot, don't buy from anyone, and
confound the dirt to Hell where they belong.
Whatever you do, make sure that the drug war scums play your game, and
not vice-versa. My gosh, to hear it their way, they've saved us. To hear
it my way, I could have gone through all my life and never known that I
was "suffering" if they hadn't been there to intervene.
As to your novel approach, it won't work. The dirt will still be in
charge of things, and methadone is a maintenance drug, and not a cure.
The same applies to speed, except, I personally know that you can take
or leave speed, while there is no substitute for heroin or any true
narcotic.
I really get a little sick of hearing the warriors talk about it all,
and then brag that they have never used any of it. They are not
qualified to flap their lips. I have digressed, and am beginning to
scroll, therefore I wish you all a happy 4th, and say so long.
Chip Flintknapper
Of course not! Cocaine and Speed are stimulants, not narcotics, so
similar rules cannot apply. What is all this "treatment" stuff anyway?
Sounds like bull to me.
I took my last blast 11 years ago. That doesn't mean that I have become
one of the scums.
If I had it all to do over again, I still would have smoked pot and used
psychedelics. That's what set me free. Psychedelics are not like
narcotics, you don't need to keep taking them. I began using narcotics
in the hospital, not at some rave. Then I lost my need for them.
There are some folks who never do lose that need, especially cancer
patients, amputee's and other special medical cases. But they suffer
because of abusers, not addicts.