Meth lab closed
By John Joyce
Published in News on October 9, 2014 1:46 PM
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News-Argus/MELISSA KEY
Investigators with the State Bureau of Investigation Clandestine Lab Unit and the Goldsboro/Wayne County Interagency Drug Task Force take apart piece by piece components of a homemade methamphetamine manufacturing operation found in a Princeton home Wednesday.
The Wayne County Sheriff's Office, along with agents from the SBI, raided a methamphetamine lab Wednesday in western Wayne County just before sundown.
Jonathan Perry Whitesell, 40, of 437 Princeton Road, is in the Wayne County Jail today under $75,000 secured bond, awaiting a first appearance in court. He is charged with manufacturing the drug.
On Wednesday evening, before suiting up, the SBI agents asked to have water standing by.
Then, one by one, they pulled white hazardous chemical suits on over their clothes and yellow coverings over their shoes. Their faces disappeared behind gas masks.
"It can get pretty hot pretty quickly with all of this stuff on, especially once you get inside," one agent said.
A tip from a concerned citizen regarding drug activity in the area led authorities to the site, investigators said.
Afterward, SBI and local drug agents carried armload after armload of meth manufacturing materials out of Whitesell's mobile home before inventorying it all and collecting samples for a chemist to test. Before any of the materials could be transferred for disposal, the chemicals had to be neutralized.
The SBI agents said meth is continuing and serious problem in the region.
"A couple of years ago, Wayne County used to be the leading county in the state for the manufacture of meth," one agent said.
Those numbers have since gone down, she added.
She said so far this year agents have only raided 8 to 10 labs in the county.
A larger problem, she said, is "smurfing," when people go to pharmacies and buy pseudoephedrine, the active ingredient in most cold medicines, which is used to make the meth. They sell it to the meth manufacturers.
"That really helps keep a lot of them in business," the agent said.
According to the SBI, there are two methods that can be used to manufacture methamphetamine.
The more complicated method, which is not seen very often in this area, is called red phosphorous, named for the method's key ingredient.
The more commonly used procedure is the anhydrous ammonia method, also known as the condensed method, or the one-pot method.
The SBI did not want to provide a road map for the manufacture of the drug, but said most of the ingredients and tools used in the one-pot method are common household items.
When the chemicals start mixing, however, there is the potential to create noxious gas, hence the chemical suits and yellow rubber booties the agents wore at the scene.
"The chemicals that are dangerous to us are the hydrochloric acid and the ammonia gas from ammonium nitrate pellets," an agent said.
The going rate for one gram of average quality meth in and around Wayne County is about $100, investigators with the Sheriff's Office said.