[House Hearing, 109 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
FIGHTING METH IN AMERICA'S HEARTLAND: ASSESSING FEDERAL, STATE, AND
LOCAL EFFORTS
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON CRIMINAL JUSTICE,
DRUG POLICY, AND HUMAN RESOURCES
of the
COMMITTEE ON
GOVERNMENT REFORM
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
JUNE 27, 2005
__________
Serial No. 109-97
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/
index.html
http://www.house.gov/reform
______
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
24-891 WASHINGTON : 2006
_____________________________________________________________________________
For Sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office
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COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM
TOM DAVIS, Virginia, Chairman
CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut HENRY A. WAXMAN, California
DAN BURTON, Indiana TOM LANTOS, California
ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida MAJOR R. OWENS, New York
JOHN M. McHUGH, New York EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York
JOHN L. MICA, Florida PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania
GIL GUTKNECHT, Minnesota CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York
MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland
STEVEN C. LaTOURETTE, Ohio DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio
TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois
CHRIS CANNON, Utah WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri
JOHN J. DUNCAN, Jr., Tennessee DIANE E. WATSON, California
CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts
MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland
DARRELL E. ISSA, California LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California
GINNY BROWN-WAITE, Florida C.A. DUTCH RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland
JON C. PORTER, Nevada BRIAN HIGGINS, New York
KENNY MARCHANT, Texas ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of
LYNN A. WESTMORELAND, Georgia Columbia
PATRICK T. McHENRY, North Carolina ------
CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont
VIRGINIA FOXX, North Carolina (Independent)
------ ------
Melissa Wojciak, Staff Director
David Marin, Deputy Staff Director/Communications Director
Rob Borden, Parliamentarian/Senior Counsel
Teresa Austin, Chief Clerk
Phil Barnett, Minority Chief of Staff/Chief Counsel
Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy, and Human Resources
MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana, Chairman
PATRICK T. McHenry, North Carolina ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland
DAN BURTON, Indiana BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont
JOHN L. MICA, Florida DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois
GIL GUTKNECHT, Minnesota DIANE E. WATSON, California
STEVEN C. LaTOURETTE, Ohio LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California
CHRIS CANNON, Utah C.A. DUTCH RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland
CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan MAJOR R. OWENS, New York
GINNY BROWN-WAITE, Florida ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of
VIRGINIA FOXX, North Carolina Columbia
Ex Officio
TOM DAVIS, Virginia HENRY A. WAXMAN, California
J. Marc Wheat, Staff Director
Nick Coleman, Counsel
Malia Holst, Clerk
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Hearing held on June 27, 2005.................................... 1
Statement of:
Bushman, Bob, special senior agent, Minnesota Bureau of
Criminal Apprehension, and president, Minnesota State
Association of Narcotic Investigators; and president,
Minnesota Police and Peace Officers Association,
accompanied by Gail Baez, prosecuting attorney,
Minneapolis; Dennis Miller, drug court coordinator,
Hennepin County Department of Community Corrections;
Kirsten Lindbloom, coordinator, Mower County Chemical
Health Coalition; and Buzz Anderson, president, Minnesota
Retailers Association...................................... 48
Anderson, Buzz........................................... 84
Bushman, Bob............................................. 48
Lindbloom, Kirsten....................................... 65
Miller, Dennis........................................... 56
Ogden, Timothy J., Associate Special Agent in Charge, Chicago
Field Division, DEA, accompanied by Dennis Wischern,
Assistant Special Agent in Charge, Indiana; and Thomas
Kelly, Assistant Special Agent in Charge, Minnesota and
North Dakota; Julie Rosen, Minnesota State Senator; Terese
Amazi, sheriff, Mower County; Brad Gerhardt, sheriff,
Martin County; Lieutenant Todd Hoffman, Wright County
Sheriff's Office; and Susan Gaertner, attorney, Ramsey
County..................................................... 10
Amazi, Terese............................................ 22
Gaertner, Susan.......................................... 30
Gerhardt, Brad........................................... 23
Hoffman, Lieutenant Todd................................. 29
Ogden, Timothy J......................................... 10
Rosen, Julie............................................. 19
Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by:
Campion, Michael, Commissioner, Minnesota Department of
Public Safety, prepared statement of....................... 51
Gaertner, Susan, attorney, Ramsey County, prepared statement
of......................................................... 33
Gerhardt, Brad, sheriff, Martin County, prepared statement of 26
Lindbloom, Kirsten, coordinator, Mower County Chemical Health
Coalition, prepared statement of........................... 67
Miller, Dennis, drug court coordinator, Hennepin County
Department of Community Corrections, prepared statement of. 58
Ogden, Timothy J., Associate Special Agent in Charge, Chicago
Field Division, DEA, prepared statement of................. 13
Souder, Hon. Mark E., a Representative in Congress from the
State of Indiana, prepared statement of.................... 7
FIGHTING METH IN AMERICA'S HEARTLAND: ASSESSING FEDERAL, STATE, AND
LOCAL EFFORTS
----------
MONDAY, JUNE 27, 2005
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy, and
Human Resources,
Committee on Government Reform,
St. Paul, MN.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 8 a.m., in the
Moot Court Room, Hamline University School of Law, 1536 Hewitt
Avenue MS D2011, St. Paul, MN, Hon. Mark Souder (chairman of
the subcommittee) presiding.
Present: Representatives Souder, Gutknecht, Kennedy, and
McCollum.
Staff present: Malia Holst, clerk; and Nick Coleman,
counsel.
Mr. Gutknecht. The subcommittee will come to order. The
chairman is en route, and as some of you found out with this
rainstorm, it is harder to get here than you may have thought.
This represents something like the 25th hearing of this
subcommittee on the issue of drugs in America, and we are
delighted to be here in St. Paul today. And I'm also delighted
to be joined by two of my colleagues from Minnesota to have
this hearing entitled, ``Fighting Meth in America's Heartland:
Assessing State, Federal and Local Efforts,'' and I think we've
assembled a very interesting panel, and we will--obviously,
this is an official hearing, everything will be transcribed and
will part of the official hearing.
I would start with my own opening statement just real
briefly, first of all saying good morning and thank you to all
of you for coming today.
Because of its ease of production and the availability of
the ingredients, especially in farming communities, meth is a
very serious drug here in the Heartland of America.
Today we have some really amazing witnesses, including
State Senator Judy Rosen, Mower County Sheriff Terese Amazi,
Martin County Sheriff Brad Gerhardt, and they're going to be
talking a little bit about the problems that they face every
day in dealing with this drug.
Word travels fast in rural America. People look out for
each other. What has amazed me has been the ease of making and
selling this drug, even in very, very small towns, and we'd
like to learn a little more about that because, generally
speaking, in small towns people know their neighbors, they look
out for their neighbors and they have a pretty good idea what's
going on in their towns.
Again, just briefly, I'd like to congratulate the
subcommittee and Chairman Souder for coming. Hopefully, he'll
be here soon, and I would recognize, first of all, I think in
the order of seniority, plus, I think we're in her district,
the Congresswoman from South St. Paul or St. Paul, which?
Ms. McCollum. St. Paul always works, St. Paul, West St.
Paul.
Mr. Gutknecht. Thank you for hosting us here.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and it is good to be
here at Hamline University, which just finished celebrating its
150th anniversary. So this university is committed to giving
back to the community and provide a wonderful place to learn.
I first became aware of methamphetamine first like all of
us from media reports, talking to my local law enforcement both
as a city council person, it was still referred to as crank
kind of back then a little bit, and I didn't even get the
connection as to what all the different names methamphetamine
had taken over the years until it really hit home when I had a
constituent call and she was talking about methamphetamines.
She was talking about methamphetamine production in a house she
had just purchased where she was going to do day-care, and so
we had to work through to get it cleaned up, to get her
business going, and then I learned that methamphetamine goes by
all the different names it's always gone by, but bottom line is
it's a poison on her society.
I'm going to have some testimony submitted for the record,
Mr. Chairman, from Dakota and Washington Counties as well, and
they have, along with other local units of government, focused
on the challenge that we face with meth being produced here at
home. But what I do know is we need to do something about it.
In a Government Reform hearing that I attended with Mr. Souder,
I was chairing, when I asked him to come to Minnesota back over
a year ago, we came to learn that even if we do everything we
can do to close local labs, it's not enough. The meth epidemic
that's poisoning Minnesota and our country is primarily being
produced in Mexican super labs, trafficked by Mexican gangs
crossing our country from Mexico.
So banning Sudafed and eliminating every lab in Minnesota
is a correct step to take, my constituents fully support that,
but they also know that we need to do something about the gangs
that threaten our national security, and of course, order that
if methamphetamine is coming through, who knows what
opportunity Al-Qaida might work behind.
So I look forward to this hearing, Mr. Chair. Thank you.
Mr. Gutknecht. Thank you, Betty, and let me just get rid of
a couple of procedural matters before we start.
First of all, I ask unanimous consent that all Members
present may be permitted to participate in this hearing.
Without objection, so ordered.
I also ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5
legislative days to submit written testimony and statements for
the hearing record and that any answers to written questions
provided to the witnesses would also be put into the record.
Without objection, that is so ordered.
I also ask unanimous consent that all exhibits, documents
and other materials related to or presented by Members to be
included in the hearing record, and that all Members may be
permitted to revise and extend remarks. Without objection, that
is so ordered.
I now recognize the gentleman from the 6th Congressional
District, Congressman Kennedy.
Mr. Kennedy. Thank you, Congressman Gutknecht. I thank
Congresswoman McCollum for having us in her district here
today, and I'm very pleased that the chairman, who we expect to
be here soon, has decided to hold this hearing here.
This is a very, very important issue, and, you know, if you
look at the evolution of meth, it used to be that it was just
out in the western States and the southern States and we
figured it wasn't an issue up here in the Midwest, and then it
was in the Midwest, but it was in the rural areas and we didn't
think it was an issue in the metro areas, but it is not just
tearing apart our rural communities. It has now really spread
throughout the State, and there is county after county that
tell us that 90 percent plus of the people that they're holding
in their jails are in some way related to meth.
This is coming to us most vividly in meth labs in our
States. We need to shut those down. We're in the process of
doing that. We need to do more. We need to clean them up once
we get them shut down, but as Congresswoman McCollum says, it's
also an issue where it's produced in bulk and traded around the
world, and we need to not just go after that but after the
precursors as well and address them head on.
You know, if you look at some of the things we need to do,
it's an education in our schools' effort, it's an education for
patients that are trying to get off it and get them off of this
addiction. Many of them it started at a very young age, you
know, for something maybe as silly as weight loss, but then
they get addicted, too many of them get hooked into
prostitution just to pay for it. There's just heart-wrenching
stories of those kids that grew up in a meth lab that we need
to reach out and help from a healthcare perspective. We also
need to make sure our law enforcement has the resources they
need.
All these things we've been trying to address, a number of
efforts that we focused on in Congress recently, here's the
funding for Byrne Grants, funding for Meth Hot Spots. We,
frankly, although Chairman Souder and I and others have pushed
hard to increase that funding, we maybe haven't had the success
we wanted. So having testimony like this so that we can more
vividly bring those stories back and the need back is something
that's very important and compelling.
I would also say that my CLEAN-UP Act, H.R. 13, also
addresses many of the things we've talked about. I think higher
penalties when we find those that are bringing it across the
border, when we find those that are pushing this poison on our
children, we need to make sure that they get a penalty that is
reflective of the seriousness of the crime and deters them from
doing it in the future.
So there are few things more important for us than to keep
this scourge away from our communities. I thank all the
witnesses for being here, I look forward to your testimony, and
I thank the chairman, who has now arrived, to respond to our
request to come here to Minnesota.
Mr. Gutknecht. I now recognize the chairman of the
subcommittee, a gentleman who I came into Congress with in
1994, as I mentioned, who has probably worked harder than any
other single Member of the U.S. House of Representatives on the
issue of the scourge of drugs, particularly in rural parts of
America, Mark Souder.
Mr. Souder. Thank you. I had a flight through Chicago last
night which was a big mistake.
I want to thank you all for coming and thank each of the
Members here for having requested this hearing and for all the
people on the front lines of the meth war.
This hearing continues our subcommittee's work on the
growing problem of methamphetamine trafficking and abuse--a
problem that has ravaged communities across the entire country.
I'd like to thank my three co-hosts, Congressman Gutknecht,
Congressman Kennedy and Congresswoman McCollum for inviting me
to the Twin Cities for this hearing.
They've each approached me at different times on the House
floor and asked me to do this. I think the first time was
Congresswoman McCollum even last year and Congressman Kennedy
had also raised it last year, and Congressman Gutknecht and I
got elected together and have been working together on this
issue for a number of years. Each of them has been a strong
advocate in the House for an effective, bipartisan anti-meth
strategy. I'm looking forward to working with them on new
legislation for this Congress, and I hope that the information
we gather at this hearing will help us achieve that goal.
Meth is one of the most powerful and dangerous drugs
available. It is also one of the easiest to make. It's perhaps
best described as a perfect storm, a cheap, easy-to-make and
plentiful drug with devastating health and environmental
consequences, consuming tremendous law enforcement and other
public resources, that is extremely addictive and difficult to
treat. If we fail to get control of it, meth will wreak havoc
in our communities for generations to come.
This is actually the eighth hearing focusing on meth held
by this subcommittee since 2001, and the fifth field hearing.
In places as diverse as Indiana, Arkansas, Hawaii and now
Minnesota, I have heard gripping testimony about how this drug
has devastated lives and families. But I've also learned about
the many positive ways the communities have fought back,
targeting the meth cooks and dealers, trying to get addicts
into treatment, and working to educate young people about the
risks of meth abuse.
At each hearing, then, we try to get a picture of the state
of meth trafficking abuse in the local area. Then we ask three
questions. First, where does the meth in the area come from,
and how do we reduce its supply? Second, how do we get people
into treatment, and how do we keep young people from starting
meth use in the first place? And finally, how can the Federal
Government partner with State and local agencies to deal with
this problem?
The meth abuse situation in Minnesota, as elsewhere, is
deeply troubling. According to a study by the Hazelden
Foundation last year, meth-related deaths, emergency room
episodes, and law enforcement seizures of meth labs, all
increased steadily from 2000 to 2003. Emergency rooms in the
Twin Cities saw the number of meth-related incidents more than
double between 1995 and 2002. What used to be almost an
exclusively rural problem in the State has now taken hold in
the suburbs and urban areas.
The next question, that of meth supply, divides into two
separate issues, because this drug comes from two major
sources. The most significant source in terms of the amount
produced comes from the so-called ``super labs,'' which until
recently were mainly located in California, but now are
increasingly located in northern Mexico. By the end of the
1990's, these super labs produced over 70 percent of the
Nation's supply of meth, and today it is believed that 90
percent or more comes from Mexican super labs. The super labs
are operated by large Mexican drug trafficking organizations
that have used their established distribution and supply
networks to transport meth throughout the country.
The second major source of meth comes from small, local
labs that are generally unaffiliated with major trafficking
organizations. These labs, often called ``mom-and-pop'' or
``clan'', clandestine labs, have proliferated throughout the
country, often in rural areas. The total amount of meth
actually supplied by these labs is relatively small; however,
the environmental damage and health hazard they create in the
form of toxic chemical pollution and chemical fires make them a
serious problem for local communities, particularly the State
and local law enforcement agencies forced to uncover and clean
them up. Children are often found at meth labs and have
frequently suffered from severe health problems as a result of
hazardous chemicals used.
Since meth has no single source of supply, no single
regulation will be able to control it effectively. To deal with
the local meth lab problem, many States have passed various
forms of retail sales restrictions on pseudoephedrine products,
like cold medicines. Some States limit the number of packages a
customer can buy; others have forced cold medicines behind the
counter in pharmacies. Retail sales restrictions could have a
major impact on the number of small labs.
However, retail sales regulations will not deal with the
large-scale production of meth in Mexico. That problem will
either require better control in the amount of pseudoephedrine
going into Mexico--which appears to be on the rise--or better
control of drug smuggling on our Southwest border, or both. The
Federal Government, in particular the Departments of Justice,
State, and Homeland Security, will have to take the lead if we
are to get results.
The next major question is demand reduction: How do we get
meth addicts to stop using, and how do we get young people not
to try meth in the first place? I am encouraged by the work of
a number of programs at the State and local level, with
assistance from the Federal Government, including drug court
programs, which seek to get meth drug offenders into treatment
programs in lieu of prison time; the Drug-Free Communities
Support Program, which helps the work of community anti-drug
coalitions to bring drug use prevention education to young
people; and the President's Access to recovery treatment
initiative, which seeks to broaden the number of treatment
providers. But we should not minimize the task ahead; this is
one of the most addictive drugs, and treatment programs
nationwide have not had a very good success rate with meth.
The final question we need to address is how the Federal
Government can best partner with State and local agencies to
deal with meth and its consequences. Currently, the Federal
Government does provide a number of grants and other assistance
programs to State and local agencies--in addition to the
programs I mentioned earlier, the Byrne Grants and COPS Meth
Hot Spots programs help fund anti-meth enforcement task forces;
the DEA and other agencies assist State and local agencies with
meth lab cleanup costs; and the Safe and Drug-Free Schools
program and the National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign helps
schools and other organizations provide anti-meth education.
However, we will never have enough money, at any level of
government, to do everything we might want to do with respect
to meth. That means that Congress, and State and local
policymakers, need to make some tough choices about which
activities and programs to fund, and at what level. We also
need to strike the appropriate balance between the needs of law
enforcement and consumers, and between supply reduction and
demand reduction.
The House and Senate are currently considering a number of
different proposed bills concerning meth, and I am hopeful that
we will be able to take strong, effective action before the end
of this year. I recently introduced H.R. 1446, which would
authorize new regulations of precursor chemicals and provide
assistance to State, Federal and local law enforcement. My
colleague, Mr. Kennedy, has also introduced H.R. 13, the CLEAN-
UP Meth Act, which among other things provides funds to help
States and localities find and clean up meth labs, including
expanding assistance to the Community Oriented Policing
Services, COPS grant program.
We have an excellent group of witnesses today who will help
us make sense of these complicated issues. On our first panel,
we are joined by Mr. Timothy Ogden, Associate Special Agent in
Charge of DEA's Chicago Field Division; Minnesota State Senator
Julie Rosen, who has been a strong leader in the fight against
meth here in Minnesota; Sheriff Terese Amazi of Mower County
and Sheriff Brad Gerhardt of Martin County; Lieutenant Todd
Hoffman of the Wright County Sheriff's Office; and Ms. Susan
Gaertner, the Ramsey County attorney.
On our second panel, we are pleased to be joined by
Commissioner Michael Campion of the Minnesota Department of
Public Safety; Mr. Bob Bushman, a special senior agent at the
Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, and president of
both the Minnesota State Association of Narcotic Investigators,
and the Minnesota Police and Peace Officers' Association; Mr.
Dennis Miller, drug court coordinator for the Hennepin County
Department of Community Corrections; Ms. Kirsten Lindbloom,
coordinator of the Mower County Chemical Health Coalition; and
Mr. Buzz Anderson, president of the Minnesota Retailers
Association. We thank everyone for taking the time to join us
today, and look forward to your testimony.
[The prepared statement of Hon. Mark E. Souder follows:]
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4891.001
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4891.002
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4891.003
Mr. Souder. The first panel is all here, is that correct,
except Ms. Gaertner? We'll swear her in separately.
As an oversight committee, it's our standard practice to
swear in all our witnesses and ask them to testify under oath.
You'll join Mark McGuire, who did this a few weeks ago in front
of our committee, which gave a lot more publicity to what we do
in our committee, and so if you'll each rise, raise your right
hands.
[Witnesses sworn.]
Mr. Souder. Let the record show that each of the witnesses
responded in the affirmative.
Mr. Gutknecht. Mr. Chairman, I'm in the process of turning
off my cell phone, and I might recommend that others check
theirs as well.
Ms. McCollum. Mine is off.
Mr. Souder. Mr. Ogden, we're going to start with you.
Welcome.
Mr. Ogden. Good morning, sir. Thank you.
STATEMENTS OF TIMOTHY J. OGDEN, ASSOCIATE SPECIAL AGENT IN
CHARGE, CHICAGO FIELD DIVISION, DEA, ACCOMPANIED BY DENNIS
WISCHERN, ASSISTANT SPECIAL AGENT IN CHARGE, INDIANA; AND
THOMAS KELLY, ASSISTANT SPECIAL AGENT IN CHARGE, MINNESOTA AND
NORTH DAKOTA; JULIE ROSEN, MINNESOTA STATE SENATOR; TERESE
AMAZI, SHERIFF, MOWER COUNTY; BRAD GERHARDT, SHERIFF, MARTIN
COUNTY; LIEUTENANT TODD HOFFMAN, WRIGHT COUNTY SHERIFF'S
OFFICE; AND SUSAN GAERTNER, ATTORNEY, RAMSEY COUNTY
STATEMENT OF TIMOTHY J. OGDEN
Mr. Ogden. Chairman Souder and distinguished Members of
Congress, my name is Timothy Ogden, and I am the Associate
Special Agent in Charge of the Drug Enforcement
Administration's Chicago Field Division. On behalf of DEA
Administrator Karen Tandy, and Chicago Field Division Special
Agent in Charge, Richard Sanders, I appreciate your invitation
to testimony today regarding DEA's efforts to combat
methamphetamine in the State of Minnesota.
The DEA Chicago Field Division's area of responsibility
includes the northern half of Illinois, as well as the States
of Indiana, Minnesota, North Dakota and Wisconsin. Accompanying
me today are Thomas Kelly, who serves as the Assistant Special
Agent in charge of the DEA Minneapolis District Office, and
Dennis Wischern, who serves as the Assistant Special Agent in
charge of DEA's Indianapolis District Office.
Mr. Kelly directs all the DEA operations in the States of
Minnesota and North Dakota, and he works hand in hand with our
law enforcement counterparts in those States. Mr. Wischern
directs all enforcement operations in Indiana after serving a
number of years in DEA headquarters, and he's truly regarded as
an expert on methamphetamine issues. Combined we have over 70
years in drug law enforcement experience.
Methamphetamine is not a new drug threat to DEA, but until
the late 1980's methamphetamine was a relatively unknown drug
outside the States along the west coast. However, by the early
1990's, methamphetamine was gaining in popularity and began
spreading across the country. Today few places in the United
States have not felt its impact, and Minnesota is no exception.
In Minnesota and across the Nation we have initiated and
led successful enforcement efforts focusing on methamphetamine
and its precursor chemicals and have worked jointly with our
Federal, State and local law enforcement partners to combat
this drug. As a result of DEA's efforts and those of our law
enforcement partners in the United States and in Canada, we
have seen a dramatic decline in methamphetamine super labs
operating in the United States, but with this drop in domestic
super lab activity, we have also seen an increase in super lab
activity in Mexico.
No precise breakdown is currently available, but drug lab
and seizure statistics suggests that roughly two-thirds or more
of methamphetamine utilized in the United States comes from the
larger super labs, increasingly in Mexico, and that about one-
third of the methamphetamine consumed in this country comes
from medium to small domestic laboratories.
Attacking the methamphetamine threat in Minnesota is a two-
prong problem. First, large quantities of methamphetamine are
produced in Mexico by drug trafficking organizations that
smuggle into the United States and then transport it throughout
the country and into States like Minnesota. These Mexican
traffickers also control the transportation distribution of
bulk sales of cocaine, marijuana and heroin.
Second, like so many other Midwestern States, law
enforcement agencies in Minnesota are faced with a large number
of small toxic labs. These labs produce relatively small
quantities of methamphetamine, but have the major impact on the
people of Minnesota. We are well aware that combating this drug
requires a concerted effort by law enforcement, and we are
working with our partners in Minnesota and across the country
to fight methamphetamine.
Another toll in this fight comes from DEA's Office of
Training, which shares our expertise by training thousands of
State and local partners from all over the country, as well as
our international counterparts. Since 1998, DEA has trained
more than 8,600 State and local law enforcement officers, as
well as 1,900 DEA employees to conduct methamphetamine
investigations and safely dismantle methamphetamine
laboratories that are seized.
In the last 4 years DEA has provided clandestine laboratory
training to more than 150 officers from Minnesota. Of this, 52
have received training in the past 9 months.
The DEA also provides cleanup assistance to law enforcement
agencies across the country as they battle this drug. DEA's
Hazardous Waste Program, with the assistance of grants to State
and local law enforcement, supports and funds the cleanup of
the majority of the laboratories seized in the United States.
In fiscal year 2004, DEA administered 10,061 State and
local clandestine laboratory cleanups, costing $18.6 million.
In Minnesota, from fiscal year 2002 through 2005, the DEA
administered 947 lab cleanups at a total cost of $1,202,180.00,
and over the past 9 months the DEA has administered 144
cleanups in Minnesota at a cost of $280,000.
Demand reduction is an important aspect in law
enforcement's fight against methamphetamine, and the DEA
Minneapolis District Office is actively engaged in this effort
to raise the awareness about the dangers of methamphetamine.
Since 2003, our demand reduction coordinator has conducted
more than 100 presentations throughout the State, reaching
approximately 9,700 people. Many of these presentations began
as general drug-related topics but then invariably evolved into
methamphetamine discussions.
More than any other controlled substance, methamphetamine
endangers children through the exposure to drug abuse, neglect,
physical and sexual abuse, toxic chemicals, hazardous waste,
fire and explosions. In response to these tragic phenomena, the
DEA has enhanced its Victim/Witness Program to identify, refer
and report these incidents to the proper State agencies. This
program insures that endangered children are identified and
that each child's immediate safety is addressed at the scene
through coordination with child welfare and healthcare service
providers.
In closing, I want to assure you that the DEA is fully
aware that the fight against methamphetamine must continue, and
we'll do everything we can to stop the spread of this drug. The
DEA is fighting methamphetamine on multiple fronts, and the
Minneapolis District Office will continue to work closely with
our partners to combat this insidious drug.
I want to thank you for holding this hearing and
recognizing the importance of this issue. I also want to thank
you for giving me the opportunity to testify here today. My
colleagues and I will be happy to answer any questions you may
have at the appropriate time. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Souder. Thank you. Senator Rosen.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Ogden follows:]
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STATEMENT OF JULIE ROSEN
Ms. Rosen. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and fellow Honorable
Members.
I just want to thank you very much for being here, and I am
going to tweak my testimony here because, obviously, you're
very well briefed in understanding methamphetamine issues, so
we are not starting at square one, at a place that I was about
a year and a half ago.
I had fellow Senate members in my caucus that repeatedly
say, well, what's the big deal about meth? But apparently you
all know what the big deal is about meth, and that's why you're
here, and I really appreciate this opportunity to talk about
what's going on in Minnesota, and I will gear this testimony
more toward the legislation and our hopes for Minnesota
legislation and our fight against meth for the future.
Because even though we passed probably one of the most
aggressive and comprehensive pieces of legislation this year,
in the Nation, actually, it's probably the best meth bill in
the Nation, we still have a lot of work to do.
If you're not familiar with the Minnesota meth bill, it
deals with five major parts. The increase, No. 1, the
cornerstone of the bill is the restriction on the
pseudoephedrine, and that was a huge deal and a lot of effort
put out by many, many people.
The other part, another two parts were the increase in
penalties for child endangerment and for the attempt to
manufacture meth, a very important part of this bill, too.
The fourth piece of this bill, that I'm very proud of and
that many States are looking at, is the remediation and cleanup
issue, how we handle these contaminated properties and how we
disclose them with the realtors and to private owners. That is,
that we worked on that very, very hard, and I think we've got a
good piece of legislation there, and I'm hoping to watch its
progress carefully; and another part of this bill is the
treatment. There's money in this bill for treatment.
Now, that's a little more nebulous, I'm not quite sure how
we're going to do that, but it's grants to counties that can
extend their treatment program, which is very important. As you
know, the 28-day program for meth does not work, so we need to
provide to the counties more funds, more revenue to be able to
provide a longer treatment program.
There is some education in this bill for schools, but that
is an area that I would like to talk to you about; education,
the materials and funding for this, and for law enforcement,
but I will get back to that later. As you can see, I don't have
a formal--I think that I'm talking from the heart, and I
appreciate this because I haven't talked about meth for a
couple weeks now, I'm going through withdrawals. So I
appreciate this, and they don't call me Senator Meth for
nothing.
I got involved in this issue about 2\1/2\ years ago because
the sheriff, Sheriff Gerhardt, brought it to my attention. I
live about 8 miles from the Iowa border, and it's very evident
whatever other States are doing in the surrounding area of
Minnesota it directly affects our State, and that's exactly
what happened, and there was many people that were working on
the meth issue but bits and pieces all over.
So we pulled together, and this fine sheriff, too, is a
part of Minnesota Meth Lab Task Force, and we developed a very
fine bill last year, and it's a better bill this year, and
we've got the support of the Governor, which was extremely
important. You have to have the support from the Governor, or
the attorney general's office in some States are dealing with
it, and he was completely supportive and, like I said, we
passed one of the best meth bills in the Nation, and because of
that bill many States are asking for help. We helped Wisconsin
out. We're trying to work on a Midwest comprehensive meth
approach, and it doesn't make sense to continue to re-create
the bill because there is good legislation out there, and I'm
hoping that with the legislation that's coming down on the
Federal side, it's not going to preempt what we have done on
the State side if we have a stronger bill. So that's something
that I really wanted to mention that, please, don't weaken our
bill by something that's done on the Federal side.
I had the opportunity and pleasure to talk with the Eastern
Attorney General's Association a couple weeks ago on
methamphetamine, and it was very interesting. There was some
there that gave me that deer-in-the-headlight look, that they
had not a clue what myself or the gentleman from Iowa was
talking about, and then there was some that were starting to
get it, and that's the issue with meth. Either you have the
people that you understand meth and have dealt with it or know
somebody or have heard of a horrendous story or people are
going, like my colleague, what's the big deal with meth. That
disparity is getting smaller and smaller and closer together,
but we still have a tremendous amount of work to do, a
tremendous amount of education to do.
There are some things that we can work on on the Federal
side is a national Web site for standard cleanup measures,
especially for children. We need to have a national view of how
we handle these contaminated properties, and we need to have
more research done for how it's affecting the children. I have
been involved in a drug endangered children's program for
several years now, only legislator that ever shows up. I can't
understand that, and methamphetamine and when the children are
in the presence of a contaminated home or where they're cooking
meth, we have no clue what it's done to the children, and I'd
like to see a national--this is kind of my wish list. I'd like
to see a national clearinghouse for meth education materials
and have access to them.
In Minnesota we actually have a very good Web site that's
put out by the Department of Health, but many States are
struggling with it, and we get a tremendous amount of calls
saying please help us. We need information. We don't have--this
is really about the only meth literature that's available right
now, and I put this out through my office, and there is the--
what's it called, the--oh, it's the Partnership for Drug-Free
America apparently has a wonderful set of meth material that's
been reviewed by some people in the State, and they are very
excited about that. However, it costs $20,000 a year per State,
and we don't even have $25,000 a year to get that information.
Education is key, especially for our schools, and the calls
that are coming in to the Department of Health and to the
Bureau of Criminal Apprehension on meth education is
tremendous, and that's where we can help.
The Government what I would hope, too, can provide a little
stronger and not so nebulous treatment guidelines. They talk
about adequate. Well, what is adequate? And we are even
struggling with that in our State. We can't seem to get our
hands around exactly what needs to be done. There are many
other programs out there that do work, but we'd like to be able
to say this we do know works. We do know that we need at least
6 months. We do know we need an after-treatment program. We do
know that we need to direct them with antidepressants and
medical health and we need--we do know that we need to gear our
treatment programs more for the individual. The adolescent
program has to be much different than the mother of a child
program, because we're seeing meth affect everybody. This is
not just the 25 to 45-year old blue collar worker anymore. This
is in our children, our schools, and you all know that. It's
the only drug right now that 50 percent are females, soccer
moms. There are 13, 14-year old girls on our Lower Sioux
Reservation that are not even paying for meth. They are using
it for sex, and that's how they get their meth, is for sex, and
it's just hit our Native American population extremely hard.
The African American population, our community, I should say,
in northern Minneapolis just testified in one of our committees
this spring that it is--meth has been found in the African
American community, and that is very unusual. That is starting
to happen, so we're really concerned about that.
But the No. 1 thing that the Federal Government can do is
restrict and enforce the manufacturing or importation of the
ephedrine and pseudoephedrine into the United States from
Canada, because right now 80 percent that is manufactured is
coming in through Canada in the United States. That's
tremendous. We all know that's not for the sniffles and the
cold, and they have an open market, and we need to address that
market. We need to send a clear message. A couple other areas
that I----
Mr. Souder. You need to kind of summarize. I let you go on
past the 5-minutes.
Ms. Rosen. Oh, I did? I'm sorry.
We need to have equality. There's a disparity between the
Hot Spots money between the States. Iowa, Wisconsin get a
tremendous amount of Hot Spots money, and we are not getting
our fair share.
So, please, if you can, work on any of the money that's
available through the Federal Government, I would appreciate
that. And I appreciate this opportunity, and I do want to say
that Target Corp. in Minnesota here was instrumental in
providing a corporate agenda for how they handle
pseudoephedrine, and a lot of other corporations and their
competitors have followed suit, and I wanted to say on the
record thank you to Target for being responsible with that.
Mr. Souder. Thank you.
Ms. Rosen. Yes, thank you.
Mr. Souder. Sheriff Amazi.
STATEMENT OF SHERIFF TERESE AMAZI
Ms. Amazi. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I really want to thank
you for allowing me the opportunity to testify here today.
From a very local perspective, I can tell you what it has
done to our jails. Last year it cost Mower County approximately
$200,000, and that is just in our jail, just with medical costs
and housing and prisoners. Our jail population on any given day
is about 50 percent meth-related crimes, whether they're high
on methamphetamine when they commit the crimes or they're doing
the crime because they want more methamphetamine. That is what
we see.
In Mower County we've really taken a community approach. We
do a lot of education. I go out and I know I speak a lot about
methamphetamine. I myself have distributed about 6,000 of the
meth lab, Watch Your Community brochures that we have
available, and those are available to us through the DEA, and I
really want to thank those folks, because they do provide a
tremendous asset to Mower County. Mr. Ogden was saying that
they train 52 individuals to do meth lab cleanups. Four of
those individuals were from Mower County in the last 9 months.
So we truly do use their resources. We also do depend upon the
Byrne Grants, and the Byrne Grant comes to us through our task
force, and we have in southeastern Minnesota a narcotics task
force, and we cannot operate without the Byrne Grant. They
supply much of the funding that goes with the education. They
also supply the enforcement, and without those, without some
degree of fear of getting caught, we have a rampant problem. I
know we've fought this the same way for years and years. We
don't seem to gain headway. However, I can say we do make a
difference. We do at least try to make a difference in getting
these people.
A lot of our treatment currently consists of incarceration,
because that is the only one that works. I know I had a father
that said the best thing you did for me was arrest my son and
keep him in your jail, the Mower County jail, because that is
what he needed. He is currently in the St. Cloud Penitentiary,
however, is turning his life around, had begun to turn his life
around after serving a year in Mower County Jail, because he
needed that drying out time, he needed to get away from his
friends, his drug friends, and was able to get out of the
county and away to a different area. He was able to turn his
life around and, hopefully, when he comes out of St. Cloud
he'll be able to continue.
So those are just personal testimonies. I know, Congressman
Gutknecht, you were in Mower County last September for the
floods. Previous in that day we had done some rescues of
individuals that were landlocked by the water, and floating
down the river was a portable meth lab. So we know we've got
it.
The rural area truly lends itself to meth labs. They make
it in the trunk of cars, they dump it in the ditches. We see
them in homes, we see it with children. Just about every meth
lab that we have busted we see children, and we see two and
three children at a time, and they are sick. We take them
immediately to the emergency room. That is a cost that is, you
know, taken upon by the county. So we're seeing it at a county
level, and those are just costs that we see currently and will
see consistently, because we can't allow those children not to
get medical treatment. We have to do that.
Also, our people that are incarcerated, they need medical
treatment as well, and dental, a lot of dental. We don't
provide corrective dental surgeries. We are truly in the aspect
of extraction. That is what we do, summary building, but at a
medical facility, we cannot do that. So we see a lot of
individuals who have liver problems, breathing problems. When
they come down off the methamphetamine, they're suicidal. We
have a lot of people that are in paper suits up in our jail,
and that is how we detox them, because our detox facilities are
not set up for methamphetamine, unfortunately, because these
individuals are very dangerous and they're very suicidal. They
can go off at a drop of a hat, and they do, and so they stay in
our jail facility, and to detox they're in paper,
unfortunately, to minimize the risk of suicide.
So these are just some of the local level aspects. You'll
also hear from our Chemical Health Coalition that does a lot of
community education as well. We partner up and we go out as a
team and talk to kids, talk to families, talk to parents, a lot
of parent education, and I don't just do it in Mower County. I
go to Steele County, I go to Freeborn County, asked to do a lot
of presentations.
So I really do appreciate the ability to come here today,
give you just a small, small view of what's occurring in Mower
County, but I do appreciate that, and thank you for having me
here today.
Mr. Souder. Thank you. Sheriff Gerhardt.
STATEMENT OF SHERIFF BRAD GERHARDT
Mr. Gerhardt. Chairman Souder, and the distinguished
members of the committee, I, too, thank you for allowing me to
be here today, and I can echo what you've heard up to this
point and, hopefully, I don't necessarily have to repeat that,
but I can speak for the issues that Sheriff Amazi had, because
we're just two counties to the west from her, so we have the
same or similar issues. We're probably about half the size of
the population, however.
Our jail issue is the same to the point where we're in the
process of establishing a justice council and starting to build
a new jail. As my chief deputy and members of my county board
right now are at a jail summit in St. Cloud put on by the
Association of Minnesota Counties where approximately a third
of the counties in the State of Minnesota, one-third of the 87
counties are looking at building new jails, and meth is the
tail that's wagging the dog. That's really what's pushing that
issue right there, right now, and I would say more than half to
two-thirds of our inmates in our jail are meth or meth-related
inmates.
I'm going to go a little different route here and, as
Senator Rosen stated earlier, she represents our area, and we
sat down and met with her approximately 2, 2\1/2\ years ago and
started telling her about the whole meth issue. But we're
coming up with some new philosophies, some new thoughts on what
we should do with methamphetamine, and we've certainly done our
share in Martin County to educate and to respond to the meth
lab issues, to train people, and to really hit the area of
prevention extremely hard. We're offering reward money for
information for--towards the prosecution of a methamphetamine
lab. We're extremely excited over the fact that we have the
legislation now from the State of Minnesota, which will
hopefully reduce our local labs, and we can concentrate more on
the regional effort, and you referred to earlier the Mexican
meth and the super lab methods coming into Minnesota and really
start to make a dent into that and really encourage my agents
in our drug task force, which is different than Sheriff Amazi's
task force, to work with the DEA and other Federal agencies on
that front.
I have a handout that I have laid over there on the table,
and on the third page of that handout I have the Project
Surround philosophy that's being developed in Martin County.
And this philosophy is somewhat responsive and somewhat
prevention, and it's a philosophy created locally after a class
of blended leadership students from Fairmont attended the week
long Blandon retreat. The Blandon Foundation is a Minnesota
foundation created for rural Minnesota after tragedy struck the
Blandon family in the middle of the 20th century. They realized
that rural areas, specifically rural Minnesota, need support
and leaders need to be trained. I personally happened to be an
attendee at the second session for the Fairmont area.
Project Surround involves the community working with at-
risk youth. They learned early on the youth involved need a
sense of connectiveness and also they need to contribute to
society, as well as have long-term case management. So with
that in mind, the Services for Challenging Youth Committee was
formed in the Martin County area, and the following initiatives
were created.
In Martin County we have kinship and Martin County
mentoring, and that satisfies the connectiveness that the
children need to a community. We have a brief strategic family
therapy and also weekend consequential camp. The consequential
camp helped with contributions to society and, finally,
addressing the issue of long-term case management we are
currently working on a model for after school programming, and
we currently have it 70 percent funded. This program includes a
meal, which is very important for our challenging youth,
recreation time and time to complete the homework, family
therapy and individual therapy for chemical dependency issues,
as well as vocational skills component involving a doctoral
candidate who is doing the thesis on this program.
We're also in the process right now to get a doctoral
candidate to look at the economics of this program, this after
school program, and I'll fill you in on some more of the
details in a little bit, from the University of Chicago to
study the potential out-of-home placement savings that this
program will, hopefully, address.
The whole idea behind our after school program, which will
run from 3 to 8 p.m. is, quite honestly, to break the cycle.
We're not going to see huge results early on, within the first
couple of years, but whether it's meth or whether it's alcohol
or whatever, we need to break the cycle and the cycle of abuse,
and a lot of these children that are going to be involved in
this after school program come from homes that have the
chemical dependency issues and the related abuse issues that go
along with that.
So we're embracing that philosophy in Martin County, and as
you can probably tell, the biggest issue is funding. We're
talking a $191,000 program for 176 school days out of the year,
and we're about $130,000 to that point right now, and this way
that we can have these kids and talk to them.
I also happen to be a counselor for the Weekend
Consequential Camp, and there are several key components that
are missing. One is a positive male role model in the lives of
about 75 percent of the students that attend these camps and
the other one is that I like being here at this camp, even
though I'm working really hard and I'm really tired, I don't
want to go home, and those are the things that we're hearing
from the kids who come from the meth houses and the meth homes.
So we have to give them the skills to cope and to deal with
those issues that meth is creating.
Impact on out-of-home placement, just Martin and Faribault
County last year alone out-home placement costs $1.7 million on
a local level. If we can spend tens of thousands of dollars up
front on prevention and to work with these youth that are at
risk, we could probably save millions of dollars down the road,
and that's the philosophy that we're embracing.
Again, I'd like to thank the committee for having me here,
and I'll be open to any questions you may have.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Gerhardt follows:]
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Mr. Souder. Thank you. Lieutenant Hoffman.
STATEMENT OF LIEUTENANT TODD HOFFMAN
Mr. Hoffman. Mr. Chairman and committee members, thank you
for inviting me here.
Wright County is a rural county just west of the cities
here. In Wright County we found that you really need the three-
prong approach to fight methamphetamine to decrease it. We need
the education, we need the treatment, and we need enforcement.
If you take away any of those three, and we're not going to
decrease the meth in our area.
Education, Wright County started a project called MEDA.
It's Meth Education and Drug Awareness. It's a coalition of law
enforcement officers, treatment counselors, educators, parent/
teacher organizations, different branches of the Government, to
try to get together and come up with different ways of
educating our citizens. We're trying to break it up into not
only a county organization but a city, a local organization
that are able to get out in the communities in the various
cities and educate the citizens there, give them some ownership
in this fight against methamphetamine. We're trying to get more
people out there, like the sheriff here going out there,
they're giving presentations, but now we're getting citizens
going out and giving presentations at the Kiwanis, Lions Club,
to Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts. We're bringing in presenters
from all over the United States to come in and gave them their
stories. So education in Wright County is very important.
Treatment, treatment is also very important. We found, like
some of the other representatives said, 28-day program doesn't
work, OK. So we talk to the counselors about what does work.
What the counselors in our area are saying, they need the
drying-out process, they need to be in jail 6 months, 7 months,
a year, until they're finally dried out enough so that the
treatment can work. Well, do they get the treatment after
they're in prison or during prison? They need it during their
jail time in prison. Right now, of course, we don't have
funding. The local county jails don't have funding to provide
treatment while they're in jail. Even our prison systems now,
the treatment programs in prison is lacking. We need more
funding for the treatment while they're in prison, while
they're in the county jails. So treatment is a very important
factor.
Enforcement, enforcement, we need funding for enforcement,
especially in the rural areas. We have three police departments
in Wright County. Two of the three police departments have
either three officers or five officers. They can't afford right
now, out of their city budget, to put one person on a task
force or have a narcotics unit to fight drugs in our area. It's
just--the finance area can't cover that in their budget. We
need some type of a funding. Byrne Grant is great. Byrne Grant
provides a lot of money for Minnesota. I forget if it's $8
million, how much it is, but that's a good start, but it's not
enough.
The funding for law enforcement officers due to Byrne
funding has not increased in probably 5, 6 years. The funding
that goes directly to the drug task force officers has not
increased. It needs to increase. We need to get that money out
to the rural cities that can't afford to put an officer on a
drug task force. We need assistance not only on a Federal level
but a local level in giving that money directly to some of
these outstate agencies, including Wright County and Mower and
the southern border of Iowa.
The methamphetamine, Minnesota Legislature has helped us
out quite a bit with this pseudoephedrine legislation. It's
going to help out the mom-and-pop meth labs. It's going to
reduce the number of meth labs in rural America, rural
Minnesota, I should say, substantially. But, again, 80 percent
of the meth in Minnesota comes from outside of Minnesota. So it
will help the mom-and-pop labs, but due to increased amounts of
methamphetamine coming from Mexico and Mexican nationals
bringing them up into Minnesota has a dramatic effect on Wright
County.
Right now we have a problem with identifying these drug
rings, the Mexican national drug rings. No documentation, you
know, you arrest somebody, you have no idea who they are. If
they're able to be deported, we usually see them back within
the month, and there's really no way to track some of these
individuals right now. We need some type of help from the
Federal Government and decreasing the ability from this meth
and people that are providing the meth from coming across our
borders, not only the Mexican border but also from Canada. So
any assistance that the Federal Government can help us on that
aspect, it would be greatly appreciated. Other than that, I'll
stop my comments right now.
Mr. Souder. Thank you. Ms. Gaertner, we swear in all our
witnesses. If you'll stand and raise your right hand.
[Witness sworn.]
Mr. Souder. Let the record show that she responded in the
affirmative. Thank you for joining us today.
STATEMENT OF SUSAN GAERTNER
Ms. Gaertner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the
committee. I am truly honored to be here this morning, and it
is a difficult task to talk about this issue in 5 minutes,
particularly since I'm a lawyer, but I'll do my very best to
keep my remarks brief and highlight what I consider the most
important points.
I have been a felony prosecutor in this community for over
two decades, and I have never encountered a crime trend or
social issue that I have found as frightening and as having
such an impact on my community as the methamphetamine epidemic.
It used to be a rural phenomena. It is not anymore. We are
beginning to feel the effects very intensely in Ramsey County,
which is a jurisdiction of over half a million people,
including St. Paul, where we are today. Ramsey County is waking
up to its own meth problem.
Methamphetamine drug charges accounted for nearly 29
percent of all our drug cases last year, 301 cases. That is up
from only 20 cases as recently as 1999. In fact,
methamphetamine drug charges now account for 10 percent of all
the felonies we prosecute in Ramsey County. That is just the
drug charges themselves, and, obviously, what we're seeing is
violent crime. Obviously, few buy methamphetamine. I could give
you countless examples. I'll give you only one.
We are currently prosecuting a man who was in a fit of
paranoia. Fueled by his methamphetamine use, he stabbed his
wife multiple times and beat her with a broom in the presence
of their very young children. I mentioned that case in
particular because of Ms. McCollum's commitment to domestic
abuse in our community. It's having a negative impact on that
kind of crime and really across the board with violent crimes.
But what to me is almost the most frightening aspect of this
epidemic is how it's affecting our children.
In Ramsey County, about 40 percent of our child protection
cases involve drug use. Of those cases, 80 to 90 percent
involve methamphetamine use. We're feeling that problem, the
meth problem in our child protection cases, but we anticipate
it will only get worse. In Carver County, which is the
neighboring county, it's not as populated, 90 percent of the
children in foster care in March 2004 were there because of
methamphetamine.
Now, statewide last year methamphetamine accounted for
nearly 40 percent of drug charges, and the number of meth
offenders in our State prisons, you've probably heard that,
you'll hear that again, has nearly doubled in 2 years. The cost
now in Minnesota of methamphetamine use has topped $130
million, according to the Minnesota Department of Corrections,
including law enforcement corrections, prosecution, child
welfare treatment and environmental cleanup costs. But what it
doesn't include in that figure is other costs related to drug
use, such as healthcare costs, as I mentioned domestic abuse,
identity theft, burglary, assault. I recently read that in the
west coast jurisdictions they're estimating that 80 to 90
percent of their identity theft cases are connected to
methamphetamine use. So we can fully expect that multiple
consequence will be occurring in our jurisdictions as well.
As I'm sure you know, the problem can get worse. We expect
it will get worse. According to a study conducted by economists
in Multnomah County, which is Portland, we look to that because
it's a comparable jurisdiction to Ramsey County, they found
that meth-related problems cost each household in that
jurisdiction $363 in 2004, and that doesn't even include law
enforcement costs, such as jails, prosecution costs, things of
that nature, just other kinds of costs not related to criminal
justice.
So what do I think we need to do? I very much believe in a
three-prong approach. First of all, interdiction. The Minnesota
State Legislature has made very significant strides. I commend
Senator Rosen and her colleagues for getting at the
availability of pseudoephedrine in our community so that can
have an impact on the meth labs, which are so dangerous, but
that is just a first step. When you consider, as has been said
many times, 80 to some percent of this drug comes from super
labs, we need to be looking at, first of all, and this has been
mentioned, massive quantities of pseudoephedrine that are
unlawfully imported into this country that far exceed the needs
of allergy suffers, such as myself. It's coming in here and
it's getting turned into methamphetamine; and, second of all,
even if it's not being lawfully imported into this country,
we're seeing the final product, the methamphetamine coming from
Mexico. We have to interdict this very dangerous drug.
Second of all--I see my red light is on, so I'm going to do
it fast. Treatment, I can go on and on and on. We cannot
imprison our way out of this situation, even though I'm a
prosecutor and I do put people in prison for a living, and I'm
proud of it, we can't imprison our way out of this problem. We
need more treatment. It's been mentioned $750,000 in treatment
in the last legislative session. To treat 1,000 addicts, which
would just be a tip of the iceberg, would be $6\1/2\ million,
and that would be a very significant investment. If you put
those same 1,000 people in prison, it would be $22 million,
over three times as much.
We need treatment money, and we need to support education
efforts. We've heard a lot about this. There are individuals at
this table that are working hard on education. We need to
support that. A week doesn't go by that I'm not speaking to
some group about methamphetamine and what I've seen as a
prosecutor. My favorite groups are high schools. They need to
know what can happen when you dabble in this drug, but the
individuals at this table and other people who are working out
there in this area can't do it alone. We need support for
education.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Gaertner follows:]
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[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4891.029
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T4891.030
Mr. Souder. Well, I thank you all for your testimony. Let
me share a couple things first.
The timing of this hearing is timely and very efficacious.
So let me first say that we appreciate 5 minutes is impossible,
even with all the questions to summarize, but we need as much
printed material as you can get us so that the staff can pour
through this. We are in the process of putting together a major
meth package. We, at the request of a couple of the committee
chairman are scrambling rapidly. Last week we had 15 Members,
including a number of the chairman, together to try to figure
out how many Judiciary appropriations we can line up to move
the number of bills possibly starting before the August break
and certainly moving early this fall would make some bills move
through here in the next week or two. We're trying to pool all
the bills that exist in Congress, look at the ones where we can
get quick agreement. Then where we go past that--for example,
there's one environmental cleanup bill that's already cleared
committee. We're trying to get that to the floor, trying to
decide if we will do it in a week or have a week and then move
bills individually.
So any information you could get, it would be helpful to
have that Minnesota bill in the record in the next couple of
days. I'd appreciate it, Mr. Ogden, if you can ask Director
Tandy--clearly, part of our problem here is all the different--
there is no national meth strategy. Different subagencies have
meth strategies that have been created. I mentioned about the
COPS Grant. Well, the reason there are COPS Grants that are
designated as certain people in the Appropriations Committee
because they were frustrated that there wasn't a nationally
organized strategy started to designate and earmark money in
appropriations bills. Senator Rosen knows that's probably a
common matter at State laws, too. Senator Grassly has been one
of the first people out of the box with meth, and so we have a
Meth Hot Spots Program with designated earmark funding within
COPS. You can all apply for COPS Grants, but some people had it
earmarked and with this going topsy-turvy, not necessarily
where the greatest problems are but where somebody who was on
the right committee or somebody came to them, that it's not
organized, and, of course, administration, they put it back in,
and the committee actually increased it.
But if you could ask Director Tandy within--certainly by
the second week in July, we will try to have--and I know at a
hearing in Washington a week ago your international--he is
supposed to be pulling together all the DEA task force
information from around the country and was supposed to have
the preliminary last week to us. Have we heard back? So we need
that information as soon as possible.
Mr. Ogden. Yes, sir.
Mr. Souder. But particularly some suggestions for how we
would do a clearinghouse. The HIDTA bill is moving through this
week. We'll ask the HIDTA people to do the same thing, and we
need the push that would be through the drugs arm. We also need
the justice department through the COPS Program, we need to
figure out on the clearinghouse where you best place the
clearinghouse.
The problem is that these are all different appropriations
bills, so trying to figure out how to get a clearinghouse under
one, each agency would like to be everything, but, in fact, the
DEA doesn't do treatment. They do a little prevention but
they're not the main prevention agencies, and we've got to
figure out from the clearinghouse where our clearinghouse
should be. That ought to be part of our meth house because
you're right, everybody is reinventing the trail to kind of
intermittently slopping--Portland, in this case the reporter
Steve Suo is doing the best research job in the country, and
you want to learn about meth, look on their home page and get
their information. He's going to win a Pulitzer Prize or
something for his research, and we cycle into him, other guys
have cycled information, so he's become kind of a repository,
but it's backward when a newspaper is the primary source of
information right now on information on meth, that also each
Partnership for a Drug-Free America has told each Congressman,
told me that they'll provide each Congressman with any ads they
want for their district for free, that they have the best ad
agency in the country that cuts these ads. They don't
necessarily appeal to me. I asked some of my staff that's
younger, what's the point of this ad? They said, well, that was
gross. It just looked stupid to me, but the goal is to try to
reach the target market and younger people, not me, at least at
this point I haven't been too tempted. Sometimes politics makes
you look for avenues, but not meth. So we get those, because we
can get those up on the air. We're trying to figure out how to
get our National Ad Campaign to move a little bit more toward
meth. So we'll certainly address the clearinghouse question. We
need the meth bill in, and you can be assured that no national
bill will preempt State and local tougher laws. We'll guarantee
that.
I want to give you a warning. Our committee held a hearing
in Arkansas, had Oklahoma people over. Oklahoma has been--it's
been misleading about the success in Oklahoma. They're touting
it a lot, but it merely finds other routes, and, for example,
the mom-and-pop person uses--I know Congressman Newton has been
a leader in this. Again, the pharmacy is going to go to the
Internet, and that's going to be tougher to find, because you
can get the amount of dosages over the Internet, just like a
grocery store, and that what we have to do is get it out at the
wholesale level and the border level because we can watch it
there, who is buying what, where is it moving, if it's not the
Canadian border it's coming from the south border, but you can
get the Internet over Canada and Mexico, and what we're doing
is we're making it harder to find to some degree and find it
less short term.
In Arkansas--I want to make sure I get this question in.
All the law enforcement people, Sheriff Amazi, Sheriff
Gerhardt, Lieutenant Hoffman, do you report your lab figures to
EPIC?
Ms. Amazi. Yes.
Mr. Gerhardt. Yes.
Mr. Hoffman. Yes.
Mr. Souder. Because part of that--do you know, Mr. Ogden,
does anybody keep data like what Ms. Gaertner was saying in the
child enforcement and--I'm trying to match how--because this is
certainly the worst big city that we've heard yet, a little in
Detroit, a little in New Orleans, Portland is getting it some
in the city but mostly outside the city, but I'm trying to
match why their lab total is so low if three of the rural
counties are, in fact, reporting EPIC. It's not even--in one
area of Louisiana alone that--well, in Arkansas they're
reporting 700, but they're over 2,000.
Mr. Ogden. Right.
Mr. Souder. What's the disparity?
Mr. Ogden. As I understand it, there is a disparity in the
numbers and DEA personally tracks the amount of times we
respond for toxic cleanup, so that's one group of numbers, and
those numbers are maintained by DEA. We have to keep track of
the amount of money that we spend. So every time we contact the
contractor to respond to a scene and cleanup, we have firm
numbers with regard to that issue. But, then, sometimes there
are labs that are identified and DEA is not involved in the
cleanup. Maybe it's glassware or precursor chemicals that are
seized, and those occurrences are reported directly by the
local law enforcement agencies to EPIC without DEA being in the
middle necessarily. That's why there's a difference in the
numbers.
Mr. Souder. But this is an EPIC number, the total was 192
in 2004?
Mr. Ogden. For.
Mr. Souder. On page 3, you have chemical, glass, equipment,
dumpsites, labs, 192. Is that an EPIC number for Minnesota?
Yeah, it looks like it is.
Mr. Ogden. Let me ask Dennis.
Mr. Wischern. I believe it is, sir. As Mr. Ogden stated the
EPIC system, that you're aware, is a voluntary system, and
that's one of the challenges we face.
Mr. Souder. Could you do a double check for me?
Because we're having a terrible time matching up numbers in
reporting, but each of these three counties said they report
through. Could you check for our records because it would just
be a matter of calling EPIC. If you need us to call EPIC, we
will. Could you report back through and see what figures they
have for their counties and try to match that up and also see
what you're seeing for Ramsey County?
Ms. Gaertner, in Ramsey County do you sense that most of
those are mom-and-pop labs or are you getting--when we say it's
70/30 or 80/20, the stuff that comes through the Mexican groups
is more potent and cheaper and more addictive even than mom-
and-pop, is that what you're seeing mostly in Ramsey? Because
that wouldn't show up in the lab reports.
Ms. Gaertner. Mr. Chair, the last year that I have figures
for is 2003, and we had 17 meth labs busted, half of which were
in St. Paul and the other half in the suburbs. When you
consider only 17 meth labs were busted and we had 300 drug
charges that same year, obviously, it's not all coming from the
mom-and-pop labs. My sense is that it is very much dominated by
the super labs.
Mr. Souder. Because that's part of what we're trying to
figure out is we have a rural problem and a suburban/urban
problem, but even in the rural areas we're starting to see the
super lab type things. It's a fascinating challenge because my
district reported, just in my congressional district it's over
400 mini labs. I have some counties that have reported more
into EPIC than you have statewide, and that's what I was trying
to figure out how to match up. Like I say we have towns--in one
town in Arkansas 90 percent are addicted, in the town.
Ms. Rosen. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just wanted to say that
perhaps you have three counties here that are doing the proper
thing, but there are so many counties in Minnesota that the
EPIC regulations paperwork is too much. You only have maybe a
sheriff, maybe an assistant sheriff, and they're tired when 80
percent of their resources are going to busting labs. They know
of labs out there they can't even get to it, and, then, on top
of filling out these forms for EPIC, it's just a little bit too
much. So I'm not even sure if the reporting, that information
from EPIC is accurate on that.
Mr. Souder. I'm sure it isn't. The question is is it
disproportionately inaccurate. In other words, we heard of the
same thing in Arkansas where they're reporting 700, but we've
identified just in a couple of districts 2,100, and in our
State we're reporting, I think, 1,100, but we've identified
3,000 that the police have taken down, and the question is is
one State disproportionate? We know there's under reporting,
but if some of you are reporting then we need proportionality,
and we're also trying to figure out what's the difference in
the intensity of mom-and-pop labs versus the bigger systems.
I want to make sure that--let's see if there was another--
this--we first started to deal with child endangerment in
California about 6 years ago when they passed the laws. Did you
put a child endangerment provision in your State law that you
could be--if you had a mom-and-pop lab and there were children
present there would be penalties for child endangerment?
Ms. Rosen. Mr. Chair, yes, sir. It's a very extensive child
endangerment--any methamphetamine paraphernalia is in the
vicinity, is in an apartment building, it's quite extensive,
and Minnesota Meth Lab developed this bill, which includes
Department of Health, the BCA, the Department of Human
Services, the Attorney General's Office, the county attorneys,
the retailers, the sheriffs, the chiefs. It's probably
everybody that is dealing with meth is at a table, at one table
at a time. So those provisions in the bill were developed by
the Attorney General's Office.
Mr. Souder. Thank you. Mr. Gutknecht.
Mr. Gutknecht. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me, first of
all, thank Senator Rosen because in many respects you have been
a mentor to me on this issue, and I felt kind of foolish when I
went to some of the small towns in my district and really got
my eyes opened in terms of the problems that were out there,
and that was several years ago.
I want to ask you, though, not just as a State senator, but
as a mother, and your sheriffs here talking about an after
school program, tell me more about that and how it's working
and how we can perhaps--see, I believe success leads to
success, and if you have some programs you're working, one of
the functions we can have in Federal Government is to encourage
more people to follow that model.
Can you tell us a little more about the after school
program and what's going on in Fairmont, MN?
Ms. Rosen. Thank you, Mr. Chair and Congressman Gutknecht.
I can probably defer to the sheriff, but I can say as a mother
and as somebody that's been working on meth, that this
education portion of this insidious problem is very key,
especially in the schools, because this drug is not hitting the
children that perhaps did--were smoking a little cigarette, did
some drinking and then pot and then meth. It's hitting our kids
that are the straight A students or the athletes and they
happen to go to a party and make a couple mistakes and they try
meth, and pretty soon they always want that same high.
So I am gearing up--in fact, we are having a Minnesota Meth
Task Force meeting this afternoon to look at the issues that we
need to deal with next year, and this will be one of the top
ones, is how are we going to get to our children. Because of
this Mexican meth that's coming in, they're the most
vulnerable, and we absolutely have do get education programs
into them and tell them they can't make that one--they can't
just try pot--or meth just once, like they tried pot. There is
no room for error or experimentation in this drug. So the after
school program is one more tool that we have to make sure that
we can reach these kids and give them an alternative, and if I
can defer to the fine sheriff.
Mr. Gerhardt. Yes. In all fairness Senator Rosen, while
she's been up here in the legislature, our wheels have still
been turning back in Martin County, and one of my goals in
coming up here is to invite her to the next meeting on July
28th with regard to this program, so--this program is unusual.
We don't think there's anyone--any program like it, certainly
in the State of Minnesota. I don't know about across the
country. It basically covers 3 to 8 p.m. A lot of these
students don't get their homework done. A lot of these students
don't get fed. A lot of these students don't have recreation
time and, quite frankly, the majority of these students need
vocational skills, and that's why the doctoral candidate
portion that's involved in this program, we think, is highly
critical.
If you could think of it in terms of students from ages 10
to 18, which is what this program that we're looking at
hopefully starting this fall, targeting that group, it takes
them off the street during those critical hours. We feel
there's going to be a reduction in teen pregnancy. Obviously,
less chance for them to get involved. Hopefully, a lower call
for service rate for local law enforcement, all of these things
because this program will be coming into play, and, like I
said, two-thirds--we're two-thirds of the way there, and we
want to drive this thing home and be ready to operate yet this
fall.
So we're working on the funding piece right now, and then,
of course, we got family therapy, we got individual therapy,
and my experience has been not only working through kinship and
mentoring, which I happen to be a mentor myself, but also
working on funding grants.
These kids are hungry, constantly. They just don't get fed,
and it's very hard to learn. You know, we've got our Federal
programs for breakfast and for the hot meals at lunch and all
those other things, and they're just starved, they really,
really are starving.
Mr. Gutknecht. Sheriff Amazi, I want to congratulate you
and thank you as well, because you have sort of been a mentor
to me as well, in fact, on a couple of things.
First of all, I think you were the first one to alert me of
the problem of Mexican drugs coming into this country, and it
strikes me--I think it was like 2 weeks after you had
communicated with us about this problem that there were, I
think, four individuals that were arrested traveling north on
Interstate 35 with a trunk load of meth. I mean, the irony
could not have been more stark.
Could you also--and I just have a limited amount of time
left, could you relate to the rest of the members of the
committee what happened where one of the pharmacies in Austin
actually tipped off some people, whether it was you or I'm not
sure how that--you tell the story of what happened where
literally a retailer let you know that the people were out
there trying to buy an awful lot of this particular drug.
Ms. Amazi. And that actually happens frequently,
Congressman Gutknecht. It was Target Stores. They've got an
excellent security system, and they did alert law enforcement,
and they were able to zoom in on license plates, vehicle
description, suspect information and did relate that to law
enforcement that, hey, these folks bought hundreds of pills of
pseudoephedrine and some of the photo batteries, and this is
the vehicle that they're driving in. I mean, it was absolutely
excellent information. We couldn't have gotten better from law
enforcement, much less a retailer, but we were able to stop
that meth lab before it produced.
So I think that's almost always key, stopping these things
before they're being made, which is why we sought the
legislation to control pseudoephedrine products. So, I mean,
this continues and it is--it does go on every day, that we do
get calls from retailers saying, hey, heads up, and now we've
got one more tool in our basket that allows us to do that.
Mr. Gutknecht. I think the message there, and my time has
expired, is that everybody can be part of the solution.
Ms. Amazi. Yes.
Mr. Gutknecht. This is not--it's not the Federal Government
has to do this or nothing is going to happen. I think it's got
to be local, it's got to be schools, it's got to be parents,
it's got to be people in the churches and communities, and it's
got to be retailers, but I think you have--there's some great
examples of things that are happening. Unfortunately, we don't
have enough time to tell all the stories, but I think the story
of the Target Store, the after school programs and some of the
other things that are happening in southern Minnesota are
things that I think we need to see replicated and talked about
around the rest of the country.
Mr. Souder. Thanks, and let me reiterate that to the degree
you can get printed materials to us so we can assemble them and
look at them in the next 7 days will be very helpful, any of
these examples. Ms. McCollum.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate what
you're saying about trying to get the numbers so that when
you're making the case for us on the floor, which you will do
eloquently, that we don't have confusion not only in the press
about what's going on but confusion among legislators about how
serious this problem is, so I think you're trying to get to the
bottom of the numbers, as what you're trying to do is critical.
I also think we need to start pulling the costs together.
Just--I lost track of it just sitting here, just the number of
meth cleanups, the number of months to years that people have
to be in treatment. All these costs aren't realized in totality
because they're all in different segments, different units of
Government, local, State, county and Federal, and so we need to
figure out, I think, also a way to really get our arms around
how much this is costing us, because I think it will make
others in Congress more aware of what is happening, other
people as State legislators around this country more aware of
what's going on, because this is porous, this is a balloon, you
just move it around, whether it's mom-and-pop to super lab or
whatever, and I think you did such a wonderful job of laying
that out, but I think the point that the sheriffs made that
there are--the amount of paperwork that they're seeing with the
cutbacks that they're seeing at local, State and Federal
levels, Gang Task Force Funding being cut here in Ramsey
County. You can see, Mr. Chair, we're in great need of looking
to see what's moving forward.
So I think I would like to offer--I serve on the education
and work force committee, along with Congressman Kline, to do
what we can to talk to after school people and find out what's
happening with their cuts. I know Boys and Girls Clubs here in
the Twin Cities are struggling, and they run the 3 to 8 p.m.
programs that the sheriff here is talking about. I don't think
we have a good sense of what is going on in our communities as
some of these priority paradigm shifts have taken place and how
they've really affected our children because our children
aren't vocally coming up to us saying this is affecting me, and
we know that there are parents who are either working too many
hours to do that or, unfortunately, they have a parent who just
doesn't care, maybe because they have a drug problem.
So I'd like to offer my support on that, but I would like,
if I could, to take just a second.
I serve on the International Relations Committee, and we've
had hearings on drug trafficking in Afghanistan and what's
going on in Columbia, but we really haven't talked about meth
in the International Relations Committee, and hearing what I am
about these Mexican National drug people, people coming in that
are legal aliens, I'm assuming, as well as some that are
illegal that are being deported, do you know--and I ask this
question to my county attorney and to the DEA, are you folks
talking to each other about what's going on in the impact of
the cuts to the Gang--COPS program, as well as what's the cuts
to the Gang Force Task Programs?
Mr. Ogden. Yes, ma'am. We in DEA have a very long history
of working collaboratively with local and State law enforcement
agencies and one of the things the DEA does best is operate
task force operations throughout the country, and in this
particular State we have about a dozen task force officers who
are local and State officers assigned to our office in
Minneapolis, and we conduct almost all of our investigations
with our local counterparts here, and we work hand in hand, 24
hours a day, 7 days a week with the people who know their
backyard the best, and so DEA is not operating in a vacuum, and
then we also, because we have offices in 60 countries
throughout the world, we work with our counterparts in all the
countries where we're represented to try to prevent drugs from
entering the United States and to extradite criminals in
foreign countries who are bringing drugs into the country.
Ms. McCollum. Mr. Chair, I don't mean to be rude, but my
time is running out and my question is, are we giving you the
tools that you need, and maybe you don't want to bite the hand
that feeds you because we're sitting up here in the Federal
Government, but there are decisions and priorities being made.
We have collectively an opportunity to change or redirect that.
It sounds to me like we're putting drops of water into trying
to fill up a bucket as large as an ocean.
Mr. Ogden. Right. Certainly any law enforcement official
could tell you that the more people we had the more money that
we had available we could do more with it. We at DEA certainly
welcome the opportunity to have more agents and greater funding
so that we could do more, and we could share those additional
resources with our partners in this struggle, you know, but we
do the best we can with what the money that's made available to
us.
I would certainly welcome--you know, in a division that's
as large as the Chicago Field Division where we cover five
States, we only have about 300 agents and task force officers
to cover the size of northern Midwestern States. It's really--
when you think about the amount of territory that we cover, we
can only do so much. Obviously, we would love to have more
agents and more intelligence analysts and, you know, greater
funding to conduct the investigations to pay for undercover
operations and international wire taps and so forth. So,
obviously, we welcome any additional resources.
Ms. McCollum. If you have time, Mr. Chair.
Ms. Gaertner. Mr. Chair, Congresswoman McCollum, my
impression, to be frank, from the front lines, if you will, as
a local law enforcement person is that there hasn't been the
emphasis on methamphetamine trafficking commensurate with its
threat to our communities, and I guess that's all I can say, is
that it has been a fairly recent phenomenon that we've opened
up to just how serious meth is. The initial efforts were at the
legislative level, the State legislative level to get out the
pseudoephedrine sales and that kind of thing, but it is not my
sense that this has been dealt with on a national or
international level, as I said, commensurate with this front.
Mr. Souder. Thank you. Congressman Kennedy.
Mr. Kennedy. Well, thank all the panelists here for your
great testimony. This is a very important issue. I'd like to
ask a couple questions.
First of all, we have been fighting for getting more Byrne
Grants, more Hot Spots, more COPS funding, but what would be
very helpful is to have you give us testimony as to how those
programs have been successful. What is the success case that by
having the drug task force in your counties, how has that
really helped, and if any of the law enforcement folks could
just say, here's my best sort of success case with a drug
enforcement task force in your county, that would be greatly
appreciated.
Ms. Amazi. I've got a fairly recent one, thank you. It was
a gang that came up from California. They were trafficking in
glass methamphetamine that was being brought in from Mexico.
They were directly bringing it up from California to Lyle, MN,
into Austin, MN, and with the help of DEA and the U.S.
Attorneys Office, we were able to send those two individuals to
Federal prison for 40 years. They successfully probably
recruited about 30 to 40 ages 13 to 25-year-olds into
methamphetamine use, and once they got them hooked, they, in
turn, had them go out and sell the product for them. So being
able to shut that group down, many of those children were good
kids that were able to be turned around and are now in college
and doing very, very well. I have contact with their families
repeatedly, and they're all doing very, very well, and that
would not have happened had we not had the task force initially
and the cooperation of the DEA with the Byrne Grant funding and
then the DEA's assistance as well.
Mr. Kennedy. And exactly how did the task force work in
that? Who sort of first identified the people, who apprehended
them, how did it all work in coordination?
Ms. Amazi. Mower County initially identified these
subjects, then we recruited Rochester and their gang strike
force, and as well as the Byrne Grant money to continue the
purchase and the investigation into this drug ring. So we were
able to shut them down with all of that working together.
Mr. Kennedy. Now, Lieutenant Hoffman, you spoke of the fact
that if we apprehended someone that was going to be deported
that they were back again. Is that because we didn't deport
them or is that because once we deported them we had trouble
coordinating with the Mexican government to make sure that they
lock them up if we can't lock them up.
Mr. Hoffman. I believe it's both. Right now it's fairly
hard to get somebody deported, at least if we arrest somebody,
an illegal immigrant for methamphetamine possession, if they're
deported, we see them back in a month to 2 months. That's the
problem that we're seeing with immigration.
Mr. Kennedy. If they are deported.
Mr. Hoffman. If they are deported.
Mr. Kennedy. So we don't have maybe the proper handoff with
the Mexican Government, that we're just not sending them there,
but we're sending someone that we believe they should be
apprehending as we would be if we had apprehended an American
in America doing that.
Mr. Hoffman. Yes.
Mr. Kennedy. Also, you know, and I congratulate Senator
Rosen for your great work here in the legislature. You know,
one of the things we were working on is these Hot Spots funding
to make sure that--we never like to lose to Wisconsin or Iowa
in football or anything else, or Hot Spots funding, and we're
leading that effort with the delegation. Tell us how exactly
that's going to really be beneficial here in Minnesota, the
success that we had in terms of getting Hot Spots dollars here
and how they'll be used.
Ms. Rosen. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and, Representative
Kennedy, and I would like to say that this piece of legislation
was bipartisan work. It could not have passed at the level it
did without bipartisan work.
The Hot Spots money has been a thorn in my side because I
do see what Iowa gets, $4 million. I do see what Wisconsin
gets. For a couple counties they get over a million, and for--
actually, it's probably $2 million, and I probably should get
you those figures. I could do that, and we received, I think,
$200,000 last year.
About a year and a half ago Senator Coleman and I had a
field hearing in Fergus Falls and one in St. Paul, and one of
the DEA special drug agents came in and testified that they are
sharing equipment, face masks when they go out.
Now, I'm not sure what's happening this year, but I don't
think the funding is there for equipment, for training, and I'm
very, very concerned that we aren't getting the level of
funding or the needs that we need. Of course, with this
legislation it's going to take a bite out of the homegrown
labs, but we still need to address the importation, and there
is some funding in this legislation for 10 meth agents, BCA
agents that will be working specifically for meth. But, still,
we have a long ways to go, and I'm very concerned about what
it's doing to our employers. They're asking for help. As you
can tell, their productivity and their healthcare costs and
their retention, it's going down greatly, and they are asking
for help so they can train their employees to stop and stay
away from meth.
Mr. Kennedy. Thank you. Well, my time has expired. Thanks
all again for your testimony.
Mr. Souder. I want to ask a couple quick questions for
record.
How many of you here, we've heard some references, could
you hold up your hand and I'll identify if you've had a Byrne
Grant funding related to any narcotics that worked in your
area?
Mr. Hoffman. Have or had?
Mr. Souder. Have currently, let's start that, so both
Sheriffs, and, Lieutenant Hoffman, you've had but you don't
currently I take it?
Mr. Hoffman. Correct.
Mr. Souder. What about, has there been any meth Hot Spot
money in Minnesota? You said there was $200,000, Senator Rosen?
Ms. Rosen. Mr. Chair, yes, there is, but it's in isolated
places. I believe it was Brainerd that received some. So it's
very, very little that's been going on.
Mr. Souder. Any activity with OCDETF, Organized--well, I'll
stick with OCDETF.
Mr. Ogden. Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force
Funding.
Mr. Souder. Now, that's under FBI?
Mr. Ogden. That's under the Department of Justice, and we
spend a large amount of money on OCDETF investigations in DEA,
and we are starting to have our methamphetamine, major
methamphetamine investigations become OCDETF approved so that
we can tap into OCDETF money.
So to answer your question is DEA's meth investigations are
starting to use OCDETF funding.
Mr. Souder. Have you done any of those in Minnesota?
Mr. Ogden. Not that I'm aware of. I don't know for sure.
Yes. Tom is in charge of Minnesota, and he's said, yes, we've
used OCDETF money here.
The other thing that we're doing is we're using this Mobile
Enforcement Team, the MET team that you may have heard about is
going to start focusing on conducting methamphetamine
investigations.
In preparing for today, I learned that we did only one meth
deployment in Minnesota in the past, and I can actually do
something about that and try to have the MET team start working
in Minnesota out of Chicago and have them start working the
more significant methamphetamine investigations.
Mr. Souder. And, for the record, I know all three of your
agents behind you held up their hands when we did the oath, but
the gentleman on my right, would you state your name for the
record, because you were actually quoted, and the stenographer
got a couple comments from you earlier.
Mr. Wischern. Yes, sir. My name is Dennis Wischern, ma'am.
Mr. Ogden. Dennis Wischern is the Assistant Special Agent
in Charge in Indiana, and the other gentleman is Thomas Kelly,
and he's the Assistant Special Agent in Charge of Minneapolis,
and he handles Minnesota and North Dakota.
Mr. Souder. Senator Rosen, were you going to say something?
Ms. Rosen. Mr. Chair, I was just going to mention that I
could also provide to you the costs that Commissioner Campion
has, costs to pass this bill as far as what it's costing the
State of Minnesota for incarceration. We do have those figures.
Mr. Souder. Can you provide us for how much OCDETF money
has actually been spent in Minnesota?
Mr. Ogden. Yes, sir. I don't have that immediately
available, but I'll get it for you.
Mr. Souder. Has anybody--maybe if we can have--if anybody
has a more general question. On the precursor chemicals, we've
heard a lot about pseudoephedrine. Where are the bulk of the
precursor chemicals coming from in Minnesota, anhydrous
ammonia, picking them up, try to address that or what do you
feel?
Ms. Rosen. Mr. Chair, of course, the pseudoephedrine is
coming from mainly the stores, and we've taken care of that. Of
course, we have the Canadian issue that we're dealing with. But
as far as the other ingredients that is anhydrous ammonia, and
there is no legislation in--or no ruling on this legislation to
handle that. There is a penalty for anhydrous ammonia tampering
and theft, but nothing as far as restrictions, blocks.
Mr. Souder. Any fencing around big units?
Ms. Rosen. Mr. Chair, no, there is not, and we have not
seen red phosphorous coming in yet. I do know that in Iowa they
are starting to see some because they have been dealing with
anhydrous ammonia, so you handle one issue and they just come
in with the other, red phosphorous, and of course, there's some
other types of cooks that are being developed right now. But
the bill does handle any ingredient for the attempt to
manufacture. There's a penalty on that.
Mr. Souder. This off the topic, but I want to take this
opportunity to ask Mr. Ogden a similar question.
Mr. Ogden. Yes.
Mr. Souder. Last Sunday Congressman Kirk made the statement
that Afghan heroin has suddenly hit Chicago. Do you think
that's an anomaly, is it standard, or do you see other areas in
the Midwest where we're seeing Afghan heroin for the first
time?
Mr. Ogden. Congressman Kirk is very concerned, as you know,
about the large harvest of opium in Afghanistan.
Mr. Souder. Four times the world.
Mr. Ogden. We have not seen a large increase in the amount
of heroin that's coming from southwest Asia, but that doesn't
mean that it won't occur in the near future, and most of the
heroin that's coming into the Chicago area is coming through
Mexico from South America.
Mr. Souder. I want to finish with this if anybody else has
a question. I know we have a second panel and I'm trying to get
out to vote, that the DEA has a major plus up in this
appropriations bill, and one of the things we are dealing with
in the legislation is try to address some of the
international--there's only five--there is, I think, it's nine
manufacturers of pseudoephedrine in the world, five of them in
India, two in China, one in Europe and one in Mexico, and we
have to go after those major manufacturers. We can take down
every little grocery store in the world, but the bottom line is
that we have all these nine companies in the entire world, and
we need to get a handle on this and we need to figure out--we
also have a separate border task force trying to generate the
unbelievable complexity of the immigration work force border
control type question, but we are trying to address those type
of things. Some of this has to have an international component
because once it gets past the nine and starts to fan out and go
into every little town and big city and apartment complex, it
is overwhelming.
I know one other question I wanted to ask particularly in
Minnesota, have you seen this hit any of the Native American
populations, and, also, we mostly are south and center here, I
assume you mentioned Brainerd earlier, it's similar in northern
Minnesota?
Ms. Rosen. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes, it has just hammered
our Native American population, and it's of great concern, and
I mentioned the 13, 14-year old girls in Lower Sioux, that's an
Indian reservation over on the west side here, and meth is
becoming the new date rape drug, and the people that are
working with meth there, there is so much quest to come in and
educate the Native Americans. We don't have the resources.
People want the information, but they seem to be completely
susceptible to this drug, and they are following--they are
just--it's devastating in that community. And, like I said,
before it is reaching into the African American community,
which is truly an anomaly, and that's of great concern.
Mr. Souder. Well, thanks. I really appreciate it. Does
anybody else have any questions?
Ms. McCollum. Mr. Chair, I'd like to mention before the
second panel comes up, Minnesota Public Radio did a wonderful
in-depth story on the mom-and-pop manufacturing, which answers
some of your questions, and I'll contact them and get that
entered into the record.
Mr. Souder. Thank you. The testimony on St. Paul is really
scary. Congressman Terry is saying similar things in Omaha, but
we have not seen this hit the major urban areas, and, quite
frankly, that may be what it takes to really get attention.
Ms. Gaertner. Can I just briefly respond?
Mr. Souder. The Child Protection Agency is just phenomenal.
Ms. Gaertner. Mr. Chair, members of the committee, I'm very
involved in the National District Attorneys Association, and I
have never felt like my urban experience is unusual. It is in
my anecdotal way a concern of every county attorney and
district attorney in every major jurisdiction across this
country. So the fact that we've put together the data perhaps
is maybe why you're hearing this, I don't know what other large
jurisdictions have, but I'm absolutely convinced that Ramsey is
not unique in this respect.
Mr. Souder. Thank you. Thank you all for coming, and we
appreciate any repertoires you'd get to us as fast as possible.
Will the second panel come forward? The second panel
includes Commissioner Michael Campion, Minnesota Department of
Public Safety; Mr. Bob Bushman, senior special agent, Minnesota
Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, president of Minnesota State
Association of Narcotics Investigators, and president of the
Minnesota Police and Peace Officers' Association; Mr. Dennis
Miller, drug court coordinator, Hennepin County; Ms. Kirsten
Lindbloom, social program specialist, Parenting Resource
Center, coordinator Mower County Chemical Health Coalition; Mr.
Buzz Anderson, president of the Minnesota Retailers
Association.
Now that you're all seated, if you can stand and raise your
right hands.
[Witnesses sworn.]
Mr. Souder. Let the record show that each of the witnesses
responded in the affirmative.
My understanding was Mr. Campion had a problem, but I want
to make sure I called his name and make sure he wasn't here. So
we'll start with Mr. Bushman.
STATEMENTS OF BOB BUSHMAN, SPECIAL SENIOR AGENT, MINNESOTA
BUREAU OF CRIMINAL APPREHENSION, AND PRESIDENT, MINNESOTA STATE
ASSOCIATION OF NARCOTIC INVESTIGATORS; AND PRESIDENT, MINNESOTA
POLICE AND PEACE OFFICERS ASSOCIATION, ACCOMPANIED BY GAIL
BAEZ, PROSECUTING ATTORNEY, MINNEAPOLIS; DENNIS MILLER, DRUG
COURT COORDINATOR, HENNEPIN COUNTY DEPARTMENT OF COMMUNITY
CORRECTIONS; KIRSTEN LINDBLOOM, COORDINATOR, MOWER COUNTY
CHEMICAL HEALTH COALITION; AND BUZZ ANDERSON, PRESIDENT,
MINNESOTA RETAILERS ASSOCIATION
STATEMENT OF BOB BUSHMAN
Mr. Bushman. Thank you, Chairman Souder, and distinguished
panel.
I work for Mr. Campion, and I'll just let you know that his
flight was delayed coming back from Louisville this morning and
won't be back until this afternoon. He does send his regrets
and apologies, wishes that he could be here.
I worked narcotics for 23 years, been a State agent, I've
also spent many years assigned to the DEA task force, and in
that time I've traveled extensively throughout Minnesota doing
investigations and also around the United States, and I can
tell you during that 23 years I've seen a lot of changes in
drug trafficking. I remember back in the late 1980's and early
1990's when the crack epidemic hit. We thought we'd seen the
worst of the worst, and I can tell you now in 2005, that with
the way meth has taken off, we haven't, and I'm wondering how
much worse this is going to get.
The rural areas have for many years been protected from a
lot of the drug problems we've had, and that's not true with
meth, and I don't want to go back and plow old ground we've
heard testimony about, but having grown up in rural area of
Minnesota, having family there, having seen what's happened,
it's been just devastating.
The metropolitan areas always have had and always will have
narcotics investigators. They'll have people assigned to work
drugs. That's hasn't been true and won't always hold true in
the rural areas. When the resources get cut, they're the first
people to feel the brunt of it.
Congressman Kennedy was asking what a difference the Byrne
Grants have made. Before we started getting Byrne Grant money
back in the 1980's, we didn't have any drug task forces in any
of the rural areas of Minnesota. All of the drug investigators
came from the large metropolitan areas, the large counties, DEA
and the State.
With the event of the Byrne Grant money, today I believe we
have 22 or 23 funded task forces throughout the State, and that
really gives the local jurisdictions, the local areas, the
rural areas some control and some response to the drug effort.
With the danger of losing Federal funds, the Byrne Grant,
the HIDTA money, the COPS grants throughout the country, the
rural areas are going to be the ones that are going to take the
biggest brunt of that, and I know that you've heard testimony
about that, but I can't underscore really, you know, how
valuable that Federal funding is when it comes to rural America
and their response to be able to handle the problems that they
see, particularly with methamphetamine.
Talking about treatment programs, I think, too, we all
realize that we can't arrest our way out of the meth problem or
any drug problem. As Lieutenant Hoffman said before, it really
is a multifaceted response. You need education, you need
treatment, you need law enforcement, and they need to work
together.
Treatment for meth is again, a different animal. There are
very few programs that successfully treat people with meth
addictions. As you've heard, detoxification of a person that's
been using meth for a long time takes more than 28 days. It
takes several months.
Similarly, sometimes I think people tend to go overboard on
treatment. I know one particular person I ran into a while back
has been through treatment 16 times, and that cost has been
borne not by that person, it's been borne by funds coming from
different agencies and different programs that are funded with
tax dollars. So we have to strike a balance between the need to
treat and the need to incarcerate.
I believe when it comes to methamphetamine there are people
out there that are not treatable. They have been doing so much
meth for so long, they have done so much damage to themselves,
they've done so much damage to their family, they're not
treatable. They don't have the physical or the mental
capabilities to follow through, and they've ruined their
support system, and I think when you talk to people in
treatment they'll tell you that having a support system is a
very, very important part of being successful with your
treatment. If they've turned away, they've stolen, they've
harmed people close to them, the ones that they're going to
turn to, they're going to need, aren't there for them, and I
don't know how you replace that. You can treat them, teach them
what's right and what's wrong, but you can't replace
relationships, you can't replace the things that they really
need to follow through with the treatment.
You've heard about the Mexican meth problem. In the last 3
years of my career, over half the people that I have arrested
have been non-English speaking right here in Minnesota, most of
them illegal immigrants.
In many cases we've prosecuted or deported those people.
Sometimes between the time they're arrested and they're
prosecuted they get deported and they come back with another
set of identification using a different name, and that happens
all the time, not just in the large cities, it's in the rural
areas. We have a very, very large transient population of
illegal immigrants living in greater Minnesota and,
unfortunately, because of the poor economic conditions in
Mexico, drug dealing is easy money, and that's what they use to
support their families.
I've heard that one of the second largest parts of the
Mexican economy is the amount of American money that comes down
there, and a lot of it from Minnesota is coming from drug
dealing, and it's another thing that we struggle with. It puts
a strain on the courts, it puts a strain on all the resources.
The positives, in Minnesota we have a great working
relationship with the U.S. Attorneys Office, with the DEA, a
great working relationship among the local sheriffs and local
police departments. We work together. We're teaming up to do
what we can about methamphetamine. Child Services, the courts,
everybody is getting involved, and they're all going to sit
here and tell you that we realize what the problem is. What we
need from the Federal Government, what we need from you is
continued support with the Byrne Grant, with HIDTA, with COPS,
with the money coming so we can make our good ideas and success
stories work so it works for everybody. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Campion follows:]
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Mr. Souder. Thank you. Mr. Miller.
STATEMENT OF DENNIS MILLER
Mr. Miller. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, other members of the
committee.
I appreciate being here today on behalf of the Hennepin
County Drug Court, and I'd like to think I'm here on behalf the
other 12 drug courts that exist here in the State of Minnesota.
There is a drug court in each one of the districts of the
Congress people represented here on the committee. So I think
it's really a wonderful accomplishment that we should be
represented in each one of those districts with at least one
drug court.
We are the largest drug court in the Nation. Hennepin
County Drug Court targets all felony drug offenders. As you all
know, most drug courts target nonviolent addicts. In
Minneapolis, all felony drug offenders find their way into the
Hennepin County Drug Court, 1,517 people or cases were charged
in our drug court last year, in 2004.
I just want to call your attention to some statistics
regarding methamphetamine as it relates to this population. For
the first time in 2004, the number of felony prosecutions for
methamphetamine cases outnumbered marijuana prosecutions. In
2004, I mentioned there were 1,517 felony drug cases in
Hennepin County; 909 were for cocaine, 212 for methamphetamine,
178 for marijuana, 66 for illegal use of prescription drugs, 40
for heroin, and 112 other, and so for the first time in 2004,
just know that methamphetamine is exceeding the number of
felony marijuana charges.
Methamphetamine was involved in 13.97 percent of all
Hennepin County felony drug cases in 2004. In 2003,
methamphetamine was involved in 11 percent, and I remember in
2000 it was less than 3 percent. So recognize this steady and
growing increase of the incidence of methamphetamine as it
relates to felony drug cases in Minneapolis and in Hennepin
County.
It's estimated that methamphetamine is the primary drug of
choice, underlying 20 percent of our referrals to treatment. We
have a fine system for helping to pay for treatment services in
Minnesota known as the Consolidated Fund, and we have chemical
health assessors available in our court who help tease out
whether or not there's a problem with addiction and chemical
dependency. In 20 percent of all those assessments,
methamphetamine is the underlying drug of choice.
For women in drug court, however, 50 percent of them have
as their primary drug of choice and, hence, the underlying
reason for the treatment referral their relationship with
methamphetamine, their involvement with the use of this
particular drug.
The utilization of inpatient treatment, extended care
treatment and residential treatment is sharply increasing in
response to this particular addiction. We have long had a
propensity, primarily fiscal-driven propensity to use intensive
outpatient programs in response to addiction, but with this
particular drug more and more and more of the initial
assessments are resulting in a residential or inpatient or
extended care referral.
It's also interesting that we're using detention to the
point that was made many times earlier this morning as a
treatment readiness strategy. Like others at the table, I was
involved when crack cocaine hit the Twin Cities and hit
Minnesota, and I do recall how we panicked. But I never--we
never thought that we needed necessarily to use detention as a
way to set the stage for intervening in the lives of cocaine
addicts. With this drug, I cannot tell you how often I hear
that recommendation coming from a chemical health expert that
the patient needs to be set with a protracted period of
incarceration. In the past it was to get their attention, and
that could mean a variety of things, but with this particular
drug it's just to restore that cognitive functioning, because
treatment is all about learning and education, and in order for
us to effectively treat methamphetamine addiction, we need to
help restore some of the lost cognitive abilities, and this
drug is, as you know, famous for that.
It's also the only illegal drug that we deal with in the
Hennepin County Court that causes mental illness, and so to
that end we're dealing with co-occurring disorders with greater
regularity. Many of our partners are now sharpening their
ability to deal with mental illness and we're adding partners
who know their way around that issue and can help us not only
resolve the underlying addiction but the accompanying mental
health problems.
Just let me point out to you that we did some drug testing
research in the Hennepin Drug Court in 1999. We do extensive
urine testing, as does every drug court across the country. We
took a month and during that period we determined that less
than a half of a percent, 0.30, were positive for
methamphetamine. This is every urine sample that comes in the
lab. We did that again in 2004, and it was 3.67 percent, and
increase of 1,500 percent. So we know that the incidence, the
likelihood that criminal justice participants, drug court
participants are involved in this drug is growing
exponentially.
In drug court, methamphetamine continues to be a drug
that's used primarily by Asian, Hispanic and Caucasian clients.
To the point that was made earlier today, young African
Americans are using this drug. We're finding that to be more
and more a common part of their drug history.
We're here, I'm here today to say that I think as we think
about addressing the problem of methamphetamine I think drug
courts can and are helping. All of the 13 drug courts in
Minnesota are dealing with methamphetamine addiction, with
methamphetamine involved clients. I'm aware that there was a
county here in Minnesota recently considering, strongly
considering building a new jail. The consultant said as a
frontline response you need to build a drug court. You need a
drug court to deal with that growing drug problem in that
jurisdiction.
I know that there is lots of empirical research that
supports that methamphetamine addiction and drug courts are
good partners, that, in fact, it is a strategy that can be
extremely helpful to this Nation and to our local communities
in helping address the problems you related to methamphetamine.
With that, I'd like to thank you, Mr. Chair, and other
members of the committee. I appreciate the invitation to be
here.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Miller follows:]
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Mr. Souder. Thank you. Ms. Lindbloom.
STATEMENT OF KIRSTEN LINDBLOOM
Ms. Lindbloom. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and members of the
committee.
My name if Kirsten Lindbloom, and I am Social Program
Specialist with Parenting Resource Center in Austin, MN, and as
part of my work I coordinate the Mower County Chemical Health
Coalition. We are a Drug-Free Community support program grantee
and have been since 1998.
After a fatal meth-related explosion in 2001, the Mower
County Chemical Health Coalition added in its mission to
respond quickly to community issues related to alcohol, tobacco
and other drugs started what has been become a 5-year effort to
fight Mower County's meth problem using multiple strategies and
multiple sectors.
In August 2001, the coalition formed a task force to
respond to the issue, and that task force has developed a
strategic plan, which includes community education, community
media campaign and policy change. Over the years this task
force has evolved and changed and is currently the Austin Area
Meth Task Force, which is chaired by the city of Austin Mayor
Bonnie Reitz.
As a community, we've made a commitment to fight our meth
problem by creating solutions. Our community education efforts
have included community action meetings, our local experts
including Terese Amazi, Sheriff Amazi, have spoken to groups,
including our youth areas--youth groups, areas schools, as well
as for those that are in people's homes, so our utility
workers, our social workers to do education about the dangers
of meth labs specifically.
As a result, parent support groups have been formed, and
we've recently launched a new anonymous tip line called--
uniquely called Meth Busters, actually. We've also been
aggressive with our media campaign, a community-based media
campaign, including newspaper columns, print media, television,
documentaries have been created, and we just launched our
Extreme Meth Makeover Campaign, which has been taken from--
likens to an ad that I saw coming out of Wyoming, and we've
taken it and have expanded on that.
In the area of meth-related policy, Austin and Mower County
led the way. In 2002, Representative Jeff Anderson attended
this task force meeting and as a result responded with
Minnesota's first precursor legislation, which happened in
2003. In 2004, Mower County followed the suit of many counties
doing their official cleanup ordinance. In September 2004, the
city of Austin took that bold step and became the first city to
regulate the sale of pseudoephedrine products. Mower County
followed shortly after and, of course, the State has followed.
The key to these efforts has been collaboration. No one
entity can achieve these outcomes alone. Aggressive law
enforcement, treatment prevention efforts through community
partners, and commitment of elected officials have and will
continue to impact the efforts to battle meth, as well as other
drugs impacting our communities.
I've been asked to share about the impact of Drug-Free
Community dollars on our communities. As I said, we're in the
7th year of funding with that. The funding received from Drug-
Free Communities has been the financial backbone of the Mower
County Chemical Health Coalition. Drug-free dollars primarily
support the coordination of the coalition and its efforts. As a
result, this hundred thousand dollar investment in our
community leverages an additional $250,000 annually in support
for coalition activities and initiatives. Drug-free funding
provides consistent and stable coalition coordination and
leadership, and as a result, access to additional funding to
enhance and expand our coalition activities.
As a result, ONDCP has identified four core measures, and
it's asked us as a Drug-Free Community support program grantee
to be able to track things like 30-day use of alcohol, tobacco,
marijuana, which we have done and had great success in those
areas, and I think as far as relating to our meth issues, we
have seen some decreases in our youth use, as indicated by the
Minnesota Survey, as that's what we have to use. So there's
been a decrease in youth use of meth from 2001 to 2004, which
tells me we're turning--I feel like we're turning the tide a
little bit here, which now is not the time to stop but to move
forward, and so I would say that we have greatly appreciated
the support of our law enforcement. They are key in the efforts
that are happening in Mower County, as well as our city and
county officials. Our treatment folks have been very
supportive, and I just want to thank you for an opportunity to
come and talk about the prevention angle and to be able to talk
a little bit about the program that I believe is key in this
fight to curb the meth problem. So thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Lindbloom follows:]
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Mr. Souder. Thank you. Mr. Anderson.
STATEMENT OF BUZZ ANDERSON
Mr. Anderson. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and Members. My name is
Buzz Anderson. I serve as president of the Minnesota Retailers
Association. Thanks for the opportunity to speak to the
Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy, and Human
Resources. Thank you as well for seeking input from
Minnesotans. It's a real honor to speak before this
distinguished panel and before your very hard-working counsel
and other staff.
Minnesota legislators, law enforcement and local
governments, social service agencies, nonprofits and retailers
have all been trying to find a way to deal with this scourge.
Pseudoephedrine-based cold products, some of which have been
used to manufacture meth, have been offered in many venues in
this State, and the reason for that is unlike--or not unlike
other States, it's a very diverse State. You'll find
pseudoephedrine-based products in convenience stores, grocery
stores, pharmacies and other types of retail.
Again, as I just pointed out, there's just a wide range of
communities in this State. Some citizens have many choices when
they attempt to purchase a cold product or an allergy product,
while other communities have little retail activity, including
very limited pharmacy or no pharmacy at all. In some cases the
only place consumers can buy a cough or a cold product is in
the one remaining store in a small community, and that tends to
be a convenience store.
As you mentioned, Mr. Chair, I took it upon myself when
dealing with this legislation to go to the Internet, and I just
Googled how do I buy Sudafed, and I got many, many hits, and I
found out there were numerous sites which would allow me to buy
up to 1,200 boxes at a time, and, of course, as long as I paid
for them I could buy another 1,200 and another 1,200 and
another 1,200, and I think that's a source that people tend to
ignore in terms of where people are probably also getting the
pseudoephedrine-based products.
Consumers are really trying to buy this product everywhere,
and they do that because it's inexpensive and it's very
effective for treating cough, colds and allergies. You know, I
happen to be one of those people that's allergic to everything,
so I took Claritin-D, and my wife takes one product and my two
boys take other products because each product fits individual
needs, and that's why you see a vast array of them on the
shelves.
Anyway, because of the awareness that retailers have about
the abuse of meth, many retailers have taken voluntary steps to
stem this type of abuse. Many have put single active ingredient
products behind the counter and in locked display cases. Some
have put all products containing pseudoephedrine behind the
pharmacy counter. Many participate in the Meth Watch Program,
which comes about as a result of a grant through our Minnesota
Grocers Association and Minnesota Pharmacists Association, and
that Meth Watch Program, which comes out of the Consumer Health
Products Association, allows for training of employees, signage
at point of sale and so on and so forth. It's a very, very good
program.
In many cases, as was pointed out by one of the law
enforcement officers, suspicious activity is reported by our
retailers, and it has resulted in a whole number of law
enforcement busts because the employees are trained now to look
for what appears to be suspicious behavior. Many employees are
told, however, not to intervene in the sale because you don't
want to get a clerk between the sale and a methamphetamine
potential purchaser and end user because they're paranoid and
they're violent. The idea is to help employees understand what
appears to be suspicious behavior and report it to law
enforcement because they have the training to deal with it.
The Minnesota Retailers Association, along with the
Minnesota Pharmacists Association, the Minnesota Grocers
Association and Lisa Cranet is here today from the Grocers, and
the Minnesota Petroleum Marketers Association worked hard
expressing its view during the past legislative sessions when
the Minnesota Legislature adopted a meth bill. Our process is a
very open process here, and we are pleased to have been brought
into this discussion from the very, very beginning, and we
certainly thank Senator Rosen and other legislators for that.
The legislation that ultimately passed turned out to be
very workable for consumers and retailers, and what we hear
from law enforcement is they believe this will be very
effective in stemming the tide of methamphetamine use and
production. It has several features which I would hope the
committee would look at seriously as you look about adopting
Federal legislation.
First of all, the Minnesota law has preemption to prevent a
patchwork of laws throughout the State, and having said that, I
would hope that your bill would have preemption so that
companies like Target and Walgreens and Snyders and others who
have stores all over the Nation don't have to try to abide by a
different set of laws from county to county, State to State.
The Minnesota law also has flexibility at the point of
sale. Our legislature realizes how important pharmacists are
and the role that they play in providing healthcare. Therefore,
pseudoephedrine-based products that are restricted behind a
pharmacy counter can be logged and sold by a pharmacist, a
pharmacist tech or a pharmacist clerk. Pharmacists should not
be thought of as pill counters. They play an integral role in
health care delivery and support and not monopolize their time
on solely dispensing what has traditionally been an over-the-
counter drug. Their expertise is very, very effective and
important in healthcare, and it's also very expensive.
Minnesota law also has product flexibility as well and
makes accommodations to make certain that only caplet and
tablet forms of pseudoephedrine are placed behind the pharmacy
counter. Products that are in gel caps, liquid form, single-
active ingredient in pediatric form and powders are exempt, and
we heard a lot of testimony from law enforcement as this bill
was being drafted in Minnesota that caplet and tablet forms are
the real source of problem. To ensure that they haven't missed
anything, however, Minnesota took another key step, and that is
they said that if law enforcement feels that one of the other
products that is exempt is causing a problem, that they can
contact the Board of Pharmacy, and the Board of Pharmacy then
has the right to make this a restricted product in Minnesota.
Consider, if you will, just one other option when you
consider drafting this, and, that is, there are a lot of stores
that have pharmacies that just don't have room to put all the
pseudoephedrine-based cough and cold products behind the
pharmacy counter. So they like the option of putting them in a
locked display case where only a pharmacist, pharmacist tech
and pharmacist clerk would have the ability to get those for a
consumer.
Finally, let me point out that we have a tremendous law
enforcement community in this State. They're doing an
unbelievable job, but I know they're overwhelmed and they're
underfunded. I know it would be greatly appreciated if Congress
would provide more funding for local communities, which, again,
are really overwhelmed by this.
Thank you for the opportunity to speak to this committee.
I'd be glad to answer any questions.
Mr. Souder. Thank you. I don't think anything has been more
frustrating than trying to deal with this behind-the-counter
question, because when we first had the Oklahoma people
testify, I was fascinated with the law. It looked like a simple
solution, and because it looks like a simple solution, it gets
a political head of steam in front of it as it's moving
through.
Interestingly, while Oklahoma initially saw a drop, so did
Kansas that didn't have the law, had a greater drop, partly
because when the community responds and the community
organizations get together and the local law enforcement get
together and the pharmacist get together, any action pushes a--
this is an easy drug to sell as evil, unlike marijuana, which
is much more of a battle in a community.
Therefore, any community action makes the difference. It
isn't whether it's with blister packs, Meth Watch is notifying
particularly in small communities. It's not like the pharmacist
where a girl working in the morning or a boy working in the
evening can't figure out who is coming in to buy
pseudoephedrine. Furthermore, larger retailers can track, you
can see where it goes, you can see which pharmacy is selling or
having stolen twice or three times the amount. This isn't hard,
and why we went after these small-town grocery stores and
pharmacies, I do not know. I grew up in a small town. They're
closing down left and right anyway, and what we're going to do
is wind up accelerating that rate of close down with, namely,
trying to address meth, which may not work. With that said,
we're past the point of being able to preempt. Too many States
have done this. Hopefully, if we pass a Federal law, States can
then start emulating, back up a sense. But politically this has
got such a head of steam, maybe we can get future States to do
some compromises and types of things you did here behind. But
I'm as aggressive law enforcement, anti-drug guy as there is in
Congress, and I've just never seen anything not based on fact
move this quickly, because it seems like a simple solution,
and, in fact, we see in the mom-and-pops that you can get more
control of the mom-and-pops. The question is then what happens.
That it doesn't mean it's not at too high a level, but where
groups get active, like Ms. Lindbloom, you can see effects, and
it's great to hear that it's dropping, and what happens is that
we're seeing some of those drops in rural areas that are
aggressive. What we aren't seeing is the national drop overall,
and we're seeing it move into more heavily populated areas and
come into different types of groups.
Mr. Miller in the drug courts, that was really interesting
testimony. Also, because you're moving people through, we get
to see the hard data with it.
Given the fact that cocaine is largely coming in through
Hispanic groups, do you think it's the distribution networks
that have led to the differences in the African American
community from the other communities as to why crack and
cocaine still seems to be in the urban areas the choice of
drugs for African Americans, although you see some meth, as
opposed to the others where it switched so fast?
Mr. Miller. I do know that just in terms of affordability,
you can buy a gram of methamphetamine for $70 over on Lake
Street and so----
Mr. Souder. Compared to crack what is it?
Mr. Miller. I'd have to call on my colleague, Gail Baez.
Gail is a prosecuting attorney in Minneapolis.
Gail, do you know what the street value is going for a gram
of cocaine?
Ms. Baez. Well, we've heard it's about $20 for a hit, and,
actually, what law enforcement has told me is that
methamphetamine and cocaine are comparable prices, but the same
amount of meth gives a longer high. Perhaps Mr. Bushman could
speak on that.
Mr. Souder. Rather than try to repeat that for the record,
will you stand and raise your hand and be sworn?
[Witness sworn.]
Mr. Souder. And would you spell your last name?
Ms. Baez. B-a-e-z.
Mr. Souder. Mr. Bushman, did you want to add anything to
that?
Mr. Bushman. I'd just say that Ms. Baez is right about
that. The price for cocaine and methamphetamine is pretty much
similar. Cocaine, of course, is sold by the rock, and they
repeat that activity hour after hour, day after day, and I
think part of the difference is that there's the competition.
You know, the people that are supplying the drugs to those
groups, you know, they're in competition with each other and
they want to keep their drugs flowing so they get their share
of the money. So I think that's had a lot to do with seeing how
different groups stick with different drugs.
Mr. Souder. Although they both may come in Hispanic
networks, when they hit the streets of Minneapolis and St.
Paul, the local distribution networks are African American in
one case and more likely to be Mexican or Asian in the other.
Mr. Bushman. Yes, and they have their turf and they have
their customers, and they're very protective of that, so that's
their----
Mr. Souder. The retail association, but it works very
similar. I mean, it's very interesting. Mr. Gutknecht.
Mr. Gutknecht. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just wanted
to point out that--not that I shop for cold medicines that
much, but I happened to be in a store the other day and already
appearing, the market is responding with pseudo-free cold
medications. As a matter of fact, we've had testimony from
folks here on this committee and on others that the
pseudoephedrine really is not even necessary anymore. The truth
of the matter is we can provide--we can produce cold medicines
that are every bit as effective without using it at all, and I
think that's something else we can do at a Federal level, is
encourage and pressure some of the pharmaceutical companies to
begin to just write it right out of the script.
Let me also thank you, Buzz, in what the retailers are
doing, because I think there are an awful lot of good examples
of doing the right thing and helping and working together to
try and get more of this product off.
Now, the other problem you talk about is the ability to
literally go on line and buy large quantities of that. Do you
have any recommendations on how we stop that?
Mr. Anderson. Mr. Chair, Congressman Gutknecht, I actually
do not. It's one of those illusive things that evades us in
many, many issues, whether it's sales tax issues or drug
issues. You know, the Internet is something that didn't exist
even just a few years ago, and now it's very widely used by
many, many people, and I do not know how you get a handle on
that.
Mr. Chair, Congress Gutknecht, if I could make one more
comment with your permission?
One of my members was in town on Friday and they provided
service to retailers so that by just swiping a driver license
on a return they can check very effectively for fraud and
abuse. They're actually now working on technology which might
help to also use that same system to track sales of purchases
of pseudoephedrine product. Minnesota law requires logging if
you buy a caplet or a tablet form. But, again, it's something
that is probably not effective in terms of stemming the tide
because people can buy two boxes in a large city at Snyders and
go across the street to Target and buy two boxes and to another
neighborhood and buy two boxes, and, yes, they log every place,
but every previous retail store has no idea that they just
bought two boxes somewhere else.
And, so, if you really want to get a handle on that, and I
know this gets into privacy issues and all of that, you have to
have something which shows instantaneously that somebody just
bought in these specific locations, otherwise the logging is
very limited in terms of its use, unless you're using it to
find information about prosecuting people for having purchased
too much.
Mr. Gutknecht. Well, let me just say that in the end I
think trying to limit the ability of people to get drugs,
whether it's heroin or cocaine or pseudoephedrine or whatever,
is of limited success. Ultimately I think it's programs like
Ms. Lindbloom's that really is going to start to make a
difference, we hope, and what we're really looking for, I
think, at Federal levels are examples of success, and if we can
encourage kids and other folks not to get started, it saves us
a whole lot of problems on the other end.
So I don't have any further questions, but I want to thank
all of you for coming to testify. I think this has been a very,
very good hearing. Thank you.
Mr. Souder. Congresswoman McCollum.
Ms. McCollum. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Chair, before we conclude and wrap up the testimony, I
want to offer to try and let the members of this committee to
ask Chairman Hyde for a hearing, in either full committee or
subcommittee, to deal with the super lab problem with the
Mexican traffickers. I know you've heard this before, because I
always check and see what's out on your Web site, what the
committee has been working on, and one of your committees a
drug enforcement person from the DEA, and I quote him, says
perhaps the greatest emerging drug threat from Mexico is the
production of methamphetamine sale and trafficking here in the
United States.
So we need to look at this internationally at the same time
as we're looking at what we're doing internally here.
We heard of many costs, Mr. Bushman, and we're going to
maybe try to put them together, from after school to drug court
to locking people up. But you and I had a conversation in my
office, and I mentioned it at the hearing that Mr. Souder had
back in Washington that I was able to participate in, talking
about what we don't know about methamphetamine. We don't know
its long-term effects on children who have been exposed to it.
We don't really know how to treat this addiction because it's
unlike any other, and the CBC is working on it. But you and I
talked about law enforcement officers, social service people
coming in later on and dealing with either cleanup for social
service or their arrest that your offices are facing.
Could you tell me, are we any further along in identifying
this as a hazardous substance for law enforcement, if there's
been any progress made in the past years to either have this
flagged out on a health record so that we take care of people
in the future or if you're seeing increased exposure and
starting to see the long-term risks?
Mr. Bushman. I can answer that question in a couple of
ways, Congressman McCollum. We know that the substances and the
chemicals that they're using to make methamphetamine are
hazardous, and we know just based on the training what will
happen to ether, what can happen with paint thinner, how
dangerous anhydrous ammonia is, and I suppose the greatest
stride that we've made with this is we've put a lot of effort,
a lot of time and a lot of money into training the First
Responders about the dangers and how to protect themselves from
the pathogens, from the chemicals, from the residuals.
Years ago when I started my career, when we had a meth lab,
we walked in dressed as we were and we took it apart, and it
smelled bad. You know, we knew that. Now we understand what the
dangers are. Unfortunately, I still think we're at the point
where it's new enough where we don't know what the long-term
effects can be to a person who day in and day out responds to
meth labs.
I am familiar with cases there our DEA agents, that our
police officers around the country that have had problems that
they attribute to exposure to hazardous chemicals, lung
problems, liver problems, blood diseases. Now that we use the
protective gear, now that we're more careful, it's going to be
a few years before we really know if we're doing the right
thing or what the long-term effects of this are.
When you go back and look at the people that we arrest or
the children that we take out of these houses, I mean, the
damage and the problems caused by meth labs to those people,
they're evident. Talk to the people in child protection, talk
to the doctors, talk to the nurses that treat these people and
see the problems these kids are having from crawling around on
carpets or on floors that are full of residuals from producing
methamphetamine, the acids, things like that.
I do a lot of training for First Responders, for law
enforcement, for medical personnel, and I show this tape that
shows how methamphetamine is made, and the comment I always get
is I can't believe that people would actually snort that stuff
or shoot it up their veins when it's made with acid, it's made
with all the chemicals.
So the immediate effects from the abuse and the use, we
know what they are. The long-term effects from being exposed to
it in a more controlled situation with the protective gear over
the lifetime or a career of an agent or First Responder, I
don't think we've had enough time to really look at that, but
that's something that we are checking. When our people do
respond, they fill out a form notifying their department
through workers' comp that I've been exposed so should
something happen later that they can attribute to it, the
information is there as to when they were exposed, what they
were exposed to and what kind of chemicals they were.
Mr. Souder. Thank you. I take it that one of the things
that happens if you're exposed you grow a mustache?
Mr. Bushman. It used to be a beard, but I haven't done it
for a while, so----
Mr. Souder. Mr. Kennedy.
Mr. Kennedy. Well, I thank the panel for all your work, for
your testimony here. It takes a unified effort of all parties
and Minnesota has had some great collaboration. So I
congratulate you all.
I also want to mention, Mr. Bushman, you were mentioning
the U.S. Attorney and the great work that you do with him, and
I just want to recognize that we have with us U.S. Attorney
Heffelfinger with us here today and thank him for--and all of
you for your great service.
My first question to you, Mr. Bushman, enforcement, we get
these guys, do we get the penalties, is there too much friction
between once we've found somebody who has done harm getting
this poison into our communities and what we can do, and are
the penalties stiff enough to be deterring, and we've already
identified if we're sending them to Mexico, they're coming
right back, so we've got to work with Mexico to make sure they
keep them locked up. But from a penalty perspective here in
America, what advice or thoughts do you have?
Mr. Bushman. Well, in Minnesota, particularly, we're
talking about, really, two systems. You know, we have the State
laws where the majority of our drug offenders are prosecuted,
charged and incarcerated, and then we also have the Federal
system. But I think that we've had enough time working together
between the systems where we really try to find the best place
for the offender.
U.S. Attorneys office, the Federal courts have been very
good about helping us with the worst of the worst, and the
other thing that I really credit them with is over the past few
years, especially with the methamphetamine problem, we've seen
a lot more Federal prosecutions in the rural areas where
they're not as well equipped to deal with the investigation and
the prosecution as some of the urban and suburban areas are.
Federal penalties are stiffer, Federal penalties are
longer, more consistent. When you get into the State courts,
there's a lot more latitude for each district, for each judge
to do more of what they believe is appropriate, and you'll find
that there is probably a big disparity in how sentencing or how
charging occurs in the State court system, but I really think
that with all the task forces we have, with as much time as we
spend with the prosecutors, we really have--given the systems
that we have, we've been able to strike a balance to make them
work in the most effective manner that we can right now. You'll
talk to some cops that would like to see a lot stiffer
penalties, but like I said, we also realize that treatment and
education are big parts of trying to win this meth battle. As
I've said and as the sheriffs and other people have said here,
we're never going to arrest our way out of the drug problem.
It's a multifaceted and comprehensive approach, and that's how
we need to look at this. Let's look at what's working, not only
here in Minnesota, what's working around the country, and let's
try to build that into a model that works best for us and,
hopefully, for everybody.
Mr. Kennedy. Thank you.
Mr. Miller, could you talk, how does the drug court--you
know, we're using it differently here in Minnesota. Why is that
better and how does it relate to what Mr. Bushman just talked
about in terms of the Federal and the State, you know,
different forms of applying penalties?
Mr. Miller. Thank you, Congressman Kennedy.
I think that when you just take away all the rhetoric, drug
courts exist to get people into treatment sooner and keep them
there longer. They are alternative sentencing programs, by
design intended to serve as an alternative to an incarcerative
response. That is no secret. They exist for that very purpose.
I think that leveraging treatment with criminal justice
involvement is promising. I personally think that we're on the
right track. It is especially promising when you can cherry
pick the people for your drug court. If you can find the right
and perfect people to be in your drug court with the right and
perfect treatment and right and perfect criminal justice
leverage, you're going to get fantastic outcomes.
We haven't had that good fortune in Minneapolis. We
designed a drug court that was intended to have community
impact, and so we have a broad target population, broader than
any other target population of any other drug court across the
globe, and so progress is incremental with this group.
Are penalties stiff enough? I think that they are, and I
think we would be wise to use those stiff penalties for the
people who need them, and sometimes we miss the mark. Sometimes
we end up not using the coercive power of the law to its
fullest benefit. But for most of the people I see tangled up in
this methamphetamine stuff, treatment is an effective response.
We are--you know, I think we've come to believe, as we did when
the crack cocaine epidemic hit, that we didn't have treatment
that would work, we didn't have treatment that worked. The
problem is we have treatment that's very short term, and so the
lesson we're learning, once again, is the need to elongate
treatment, that we need treatment. The majority of people, for
example, indicate a minimum of 90 days, and then after that
your outcomes get better. I like to think that it's 6 months
minimum, and so our struggle is to find long-term treatment.
It's no secret as well that we have cutoff treatment
funding for the working poor. In Hennepin County we helped pay
for treatment services for the poor for decades, but now those
funds have dried up, and so our struggle is to get effective
treatment available to people and long-term effective
treatment.
Mr. Kennedy. Thank you.
Mr. Souder. Is your drug court, then, involuntary as well
as voluntary?
Mr. Miller. It is involuntary. All felony drug offenders
are included in our drug court. The way you get out of the
Hennepin County Drug Court is you go to prison.
Mr. Souder. I want to encourage you, I know the temptation
across the country is to kind of cook statistics, and because
everybody wants a great success rate, and when you look at the
drug courts, their success rates don't, in many cases, don't
even approach 50 over the long term or less, but when you hear
about treatment programs where people go through 16 times, I
personally have never heard on the street or anywhere when a
drug dealer who has been through 6 or 7, all of a sudden 30
percent looks really good. By keeping straight statistics,
people shouldn't expect miracles when we deal with people who
have been addicts in many cases for many years.
In drug court certainly, in real numbers to real numbers, I
believe it has had the most success because it combines threat
of enforcement but also gives alternatives to people, and that
kind of combination, I think, is why it has been successful.
Mr. Bushman, have you worked with any of the OCDETF task
forces here in Minnesota?
Mr. Bushman. Many times. Myself as a DEA task force agent,
I have conducted many OCDETF investigations throughout probably
the 15 years that I've been assigned over there. It's a tool
that we use quite readily here. I believe it has been real
successful. As with any other program, you always like to see
more money when you're doing a big investigation. But it is
something that we do use. The U.S. Attorney's Office has a
number of OCDETF attorneys who are in charge of that program
whom we've worked with very closely, they're all very good
prosecutors. So it's a program that we use quite regularly
here.
Mr. Souder. Mr. Miller, you said that 50 percent of your
meth cases were women, is that correct, or 50 percent of the
people coming in the drug court going to treatment were meth
with women, but only 20 percent with men. Why do you think that
is true?
Mr. Miller. What I intended to say was that of all the
chemical health assessments we do, put them all together, the
underlying drug of choice for all of them is 20 percent
methamphetamine. For women, however, the underlying drug of
choice, the underlying factor----
Mr. Souder. Primary.
Mr. Miller. Primary is methamphetamine.
Mr. Souder. Why do you think that is?
Mr. Miller. Well, I think it was touched on earlier. I
think so many women find their way into the use of this
substance as a weight reduction strategy. As sad as it may
sound, a lot of the young women I'm talking to were first
introduced to the use of methamphetamine as a way to depress
hunger.
It's also really readily available in bars. I mean, it's no
secret that this drug is a drug that can be had in local pubs
and bars. To buy crack cocaine or to buy cocaine, it's a little
riskier proposition, but this particular drug is accessible
through less risky avenues.
It's also a drug that I think just has appeal to women
because it's just not such a nasty drug. You smoke it, for the
most part. Overwhelmingly, in our drug court most of the people
who use it smoke it. So the route of ingestion is considered to
be a little less nasty. I mean, you don't have to necessarily
have a crack pipe to smoke this stuff, so--and beyond that I'm
not sure.
Mr. Souder. Ms. Lindbloom, do you see this as a smaller--in
a place like Austin itself, disproportionate use?
Ms. Lindbloom. I think we're seeing an increase in some of
the girls, and some of the more alarming cases are--an example,
we had a superstar, captain of the swim team, an A student,
from a middle to upper middle class family, connected--and got
connected with it, and, of course, within 6 months was 90
pounds and on her death bed.
Certainly, it's become more and more popular with the
girls, and we're seeing it. The reason they're giving is the
weight loss thing. Our students are saying it's a great way
to--because it's exam time, it's a great way to keep ahead of
the pace of pressures from school, college students as well. So
I think the weight piece is big with our young women.
Mr. Souder. Mr. Bushman, could you relate what we just
heard to what kind of sales networks are different than if
you're selling to kids for tests, girls, women at bars, that
kind of the traditional vision of how drug networks would work,
you wouldn't necessarily think that you'd see the same dealers?
Mr. Bushman. You won't, but when you look at how pervasive
the meth problem has gotten to be, like I told you before, it
used to be if you were in a rural area, you were pretty well
insulated from large volumes of drug sales and large numbers.
It's not true anymore with meth. There are a lot of people in
the rural areas that have turned to it, also. Case in point, we
had one a couple of years ago where a guy in a rural area had a
custom combining business, and you got to make those machines
work at harvest time, and he turned to meth to start using it
as a way to stay awake longer and make those machines run more.
Well, pretty soon he developed a habit, and pretty soon he was
selling and giving to his friends, to people that worked for
him. Eventually he couldn't get the supply he needed. He turned
to Mexican suppliers, and all of a sudden he's looking at going
to Federal prison along with a whole bunch of other people
involved in this methamphetamine deal. Very, very atypical of
people that for years we've seen starting using drugs early in
their life and just continuing on with it, and several stories
like that. The women with the weight loss, you know, I've seen
many, many of them come through the system. That's how they
started. Before they knew it, they were hooked up. They were
trying to lose a few pounds, and by the time it was done,
they'd lost their family, they lost their house, lost their
self-respect and everything else just because of the lure of
this drug. And I said these aren't all people in the cities,
these are people from rural America, from some of the smallest,
poorest counties and cities that we have that have been bitten
by this plague, and their distribution network ends up being
the friends that they hang around with at the bowling alley,
people they rub shoulders with in the businesses downtown, that
they have drinks with at the Legion club. I mean, it's just
gotten into parts of society that up until this scourge were
pretty much safe from the crack cocaine, the heroin and the
other drugs that we've typically dealt with over the years.
Mr. Souder. Years ago we had one case in a rural part of my
district where it looks like the motorcycle gangs, basically,
got a person through pharmacy school and bought a local
pharmacy. Have you seen any of that here?
Mr. Bushman. Well----
Mr. Souder. Because that would be a logical thing to do,
would be to penetrate a different type of network.
Mr. Bushman. It's no secret that for years the motorcycle
gangs ran the meth trade in the United States. We just finished
an OCDETF investigation with Mr. Heffelfinger's office and the
Hells Angels and their source were Mexican traffickers who were
supplying the Hells Angels and bikers with methamphetamine, and
we just finished an OCDETF case and sent a lot of people away
on that case, and that's just one of the trends. It went from
them controlling to now being consumers and middlemen.
Mr. Souder. You haven't seen anybody taking over a
pharmacy?
Mr. Bushman. No.
Mr. Souder. Any other questions? Well, I thank you each for
coming, and I encourage you, like I did on the first panel, if
you have anything written for the record--and, Attorney
Heffelfinger, if you have anything you'd like to submit or
submit a statement, we'd love to have that and your experiences
in the U.S. Attorney's Office, also any help or additional
help--the U.S. Marshals often get lost in this, but without
marshals to help, do that process, we lose the Federal cases,
and, clearly, as we go to bigger networks we need to know how
you're handling that out of the U.S. Attorney's Office.
Mr. Heffelfinger. Chairman Souder, could I inquire?
Has the committee inquired of the Department of Justice and
the U.S. Attorney General to give testimony either here in
Minnesota or elsewhere on this issue? Our lead U.S. attorney is
a gentleman named Greg Scott out of Sacramento who represents a
largely rural district and can comment effectively. I'm more
than happy to provide comment on Native American issues or
Minnesota-specific issues, if the committee wants.
Mr. Souder. Let me quickly swear you in so we have that.
[Witness sworn.]
Mr. Souder. The answer is yes, the U.S. Attorneys have
testified a number of times. Our first hearing--actually, we've
done two at the very--this was probably 6 years ago in
Sacramento, and we've since been back up there once because the
super labs in California started--in fact, one hearing we had
in southern California not that long ago, it was interesting
because we had so many California undercover people that some
of the drug groups came in and were taking pictures, and they,
basically, ran them down outside of our hearing and nailed a
couple other guys who were trying to get all the other
undercover officers at one place.
But we'll continue to work with U.S. Attorneys. We've met
with them in the office several times, but we're very
interested in the Native American groups, who historically have
been hammered by different variations of drug and alcohol.
Also, if there's any interrelationships up on the north border.
It's more of a problem over in New York State, but looking at
how organizations may move because we didn't necessarily think
of their border there and their historic relationships. So if
there's any information on that, too.
Mr. Heffelfinger. Mr. Chairman, if I could, the procedure I
have to follow is if you wish written comment from me, somebody
from your staff will have to contact the executive office.
Mr. Souder. We'll ask you. Do you have any good questions
you want us to ask you if you could give it verbal?
Mr. Heffelfinger. But being here, if I could get 1 minute
just to supplement the record on several points that the
members of the committee asked.
First of all, we do not--this is not a HIDTA State, so we
do not have the benefit of that institutionalized
communication. However, Minnesota has a legacy of law
enforcement cooperation that covers all levels of law
enforcement, and narcotics is probably the first and foremost
on that.
One of the things that's marvelous about the new
legislation that was passed by the legislature this last
session was creating a steering committee, like a board of
directors for the group. One of the organizations on that
steering committee is the U.S. Attorneys Office. So the
coordination between State and Federal has been and will
continue to be tremendous.
One of the areas that you inquired about is where the
Federal Government could be of support. In the HIDTA program
one of the things that Congress has funded is aggressive
intelligence gathering and information sharing amongst the
HIDTA members. Where there is no HIDTA in States like
Minnesota, we are left to jury-rig those systems. The
legislation that the legislature passed will provide us with
the framework for enhanced intelligence gathering and
information sharing, and this is an area where, frankly,
Congress could be of great assistance. It is not effective in
any kind of drug interdiction and, in particular, in meth where
you have the combination of local impact labs and national
impact major labs, if you will, the Mexican organizations to
operate these in a reactive mode. Rather, we need to be doing
our narcotics interdiction on a proactive mode.
I share, being a district--Minnesota is a Federal district
that covers all four corners of the State. Therefore, about
half of the constituents that I represent are rural and half
are urban. We are seeing not only the very, very significant
impact on local communities about which you heard today, but we
are seeing a rapidly increasing impact of methamphetamine in
the urban areas.
One thing that has not been mentioned today that I think is
worthy of your consideration, and I know that other committees
within Congress have focused upon this, actually, maybe this
committee, is the impact of gang activity and street gang
activity on the distribution of narcotics generally and on the
distribution of methamphetamine specifically. We have found,
for example, in Minneapolis one of the reasons that the African
American community is still largely utilizing crack cocaine and
marijuana is that the African American gangs are largely
distributing crack cocaine.
Now, as that changes, as we see methamphetamine
increasingly being distributed by street gangs, be they Mexican
street gangs or African American or Asian or Native American,
we are seeing in the urban area an increase in this type of
activity. Therefore, I would urge Congress to look at these as
related challenges, not independent challenges.
Finally, I happen to chair the Native American Issue
Subcommittee amongst the U.S. Attorneys. In other words, I'm
the lead Federal prosecutor for Indian country. We held a 3-day
summit approximately 2 years ago in Rapid City to focus on the
incidence of drugs, guns and gangs in Indian country.
Native American communities are no different from rural
America. In fact, the methamphetamine problem as we have
identified it is largely a western phenomenon moving east, with
the exception, obviously, of the influence of motorcycle gangs
nationally, and historically more and more, one of the reasons
this doesn't seem to have gotten the attention in Washington,
in my opinion, than other drug phenomena is this has been
largely a western phenomenon moving east.
Most of the Native American communities in the Nation are
in the western part of the country. They share all of rural
America's challenges in being rural, and because of the
incidence of confusion over who has law enforcement
responsibility within Indian country and the scarcity of law
enforcement resources for most Native American communities, the
challenges of methamphetamine or any kind of drug, which
marijuana, for example, is in--hides in cultivation within
Native American communities. These challenges are all the more
pressing when applied in Indian country.
We found in our South Dakota hearing, for example, as we
focused on the meth problem and the drug problem primarily in
the Pine Ridge Rosebud Reservation, that the meth was coming
across Interstate 90 from Seattle and was being dropped off in
the reservations across the country.
Therefore, I urge the committee as it focuses on this as a
national problem, as it focuses on this as a rural problem, to
consider the Native American communities are fully involved in
this problem and the challenges that they face in dealing with
drug interdiction are a significant challenge because of the
issues I cited; and if the committee would like me to put any
of these comments to writing, I would be happy to.
Mr. Souder. Have you used RICO on any of the gangs?
Mr. Heffelfinger. We have not used RICO in this district.
We have found that RICO is a marvelous statute in the
appropriate case, but it has some challenges when it comes to
proving it, that we found that conspiracy in other more
standard rules have been appropriate.
We do have a significant OCDETF presence here in Minnesota.
The U.S. Attorneys Office history over the past 5 years has
been that methamphetamine is our largest quantity of drug. But
the drug we prosecute most frequently, I should say, that
increase in methamphetamine as the No. 1 drug is only growing,
and our OCDETF work which is so voluminous that we just got
another position of Assistant U.S. Attorney to do this work,
mirrors that drug of choice problem, increasingly
methamphetamine, and it is statewide.
Mr. Souder. Thank you very much for that information. It
was fascinating, and one of the interesting things and you just
raised it again, that these drug groups work like big trucking
companies.
I have a business background. In fact, it's great to be
back in Minnesota. I started here after graduate school as
marketing manager for Gabberts Furniture in Edina, and Yakima
and the Tri-Cities area in Washington State is like this huge
hub. They bring this stuff all the way up from Mexico. BC bud
marijuana comes down in tons from British Columbia. They do all
these swaps of guns, cocaine, heroin, methamphetamines coming
up in the super meth, and then we're seeing it like you
described it going all across the upper Midwest.
In multiple counties in my district in Indiana, we have it
coming from Yakima and the Tri-Cities area, you would think
that they could find a better way to Indiana than going up to
Washington State and then back down. Congressman Deal, who at
one point was vice chairman from Gainvesville, GA to Atlanta,
also there they are coming from Washington State, and it is
this phenomena of certain families in distribution networks,
certain communities, and like various different trucking
patterns and distribution networks, and in effect that's why
OCDETF and organized crime areas have to get to the underneath
of this because we're just going to drown trying to tackle
individuals going to court, trying to address our kids. We've
got to get at the larger networks involved and how the
information is getting in as this kind of experiment.
The one thing that I would add just slightly is that I
think that it's correct to say that it's certainly moving west
to east, but it was also moving out to in from rural to
suburban to urban, which meant that even in States like
Colorado, Denver wasn't engaged, even Des Moines, IA was not as
engaged, Omaha is only becoming engaged in Nebraska, New
Orleans is not engaged in Louisiana, Nashville, Memphis and
Knoxville weren't in Tennessee, Indianapolis, Ft. Wayne, IN, it
was in the small areas. So even in a given State you would only
have a few Congressmen who were just--like in my district it's
the TV news lead story every single night. There isn't a day
that we don't have major meth takedowns, and so what we're
starting to see as this moves east and starts to move into the
suburbs and the city, there's much more of a reaction in
Congress that we've built to a threshold much like what you're
seeing in some of the State legislature.
So thank you for being part of this. I want to thank the
members in Minnesota who have been very aggressive in trying to
get our attention, and it's been great testimony at a very
critical time, and anything else you'd like to submit for the
record, and we'll get some additional written questions out as
our supplement and followup.
The subcommittee stands adjourned.
[Whereupon, the subcommittee was adjourned.]
[Additional information submitted for the hearing record
follows:]
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