Overdose deaths attributed to meth and cocaine have risen dramatically four years in a row

Narcotics investigators say Tennessee is flooded with cheap, potent meth smuggled from Mexican super labs

The sun wasn’t up yet when the cops surrounded the storage unit in Clarksville.

Two weeks of sleuthing had built to this moment. Narcotics investigators had intercepted a street-level meth sale in Kentucky, then backtracked the dealer’s supply through a few stash houses and across the state line. And now, poised outside this storage unit, they hoped to find a mother lode hidden inside.

They weren’t disappointed. When the raid was over and the sun had risen, investigators had found more than 54 pounds of bright white crystal meth. It had been cooked in a Mexican drug lab more than a thousand miles away, then smuggled to Tennessee, where it would be worth more than $2 million on the street.

“This was a very, very large amount of methamphetamine,” said David Thompson, director of the Pennyrile Narcotics Task Force, which led the drug investigation. “And there is no doubt that these are cartel drugs.”

This meth seizure, which occurred June 20, was one of the biggest Tennessee drug busts in years and a victory for law enforcement in a seemingly endless war on dangerous narcotics. But the bust also illustrates how methamphetamine trafficking in Tennessee has evolved, making drugs cheaper, more dangerous and more difficult to stop, according to narcotics investigators throughout the state.

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Cartel meth killed hundreds in 2017

A decade ago, most of Tennessee’s meth was cooked in small batches made in countless ramshackle labs hidden in the state’s rural stretches. But today, investigators said, the state is flooded with stronger, cheaper meth smuggled from industrial-style cartel labs in Mexico. That same smuggling infrastructure also carries cocaine, another cartel drug that largely piggybacks on the meth trade.

And as this smuggling operation has grown, the results have been deadly. Deaths attributed to overdoses on meth, cocaine and other stimulants have risen dramatically over the past four years, according to recent statistics from the Tennessee Department of Health. Cocaine deaths, mostly concentrated in Nashville, Memphis and Knoxville, have increased by at least 20 percent annually, reaching 306 last year. Deaths involving meth and other stimulants, which are spread widely throughout the state, increased by at least 50 percent annually, peaking at 319.

Knoxville appears to have been hit the hardest. According to the state statistics, cocaine deaths in Knox County more than doubled from 26 in 2016 to 55 in 2017. Meth deaths also grew — from 22 to 46.

Sgt. Joshua Shaffer, supervisor of the Knoxville police drug task force, said the city had long struggled with cocaine, but now Knoxville is swamped with so much cheap, potent meth that even longtime cocaine addicts have begun to swap drugs.

“As far as drugs on our streets, there has been a significant increase in crystal methamphetamine,” Shaffer said. “The super labs in Mexico are pumping it out by the tons, really.”

Meth, cocaine and the opioid crisis

In addition to the rising potency and availability of cartel drugs, the deaths caused by meth and cocaine are deeply intertwined with Tennessee’s ongoing opioid crisis, which killed at least 1,268 people in the state in 2017. Overdose statistics make it exceedingly difficult to determine how these deaths overlap, but the narcotics investigators interviewed for this story said they believe many deaths are the result of addicts mixing opioids and stimulants, commonly known as “speedballing.”

Stimulants are an essential part of this deadly cocktail, but they’ve largely fallen out of the spotlight as public awareness has shifted toward combating the opioid crisis, said Tommy Farmer, special agent in charge of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation’s drug division. When the public attention shifted, political will and police priorities were quick to follow.

“We got worn out with meth stories,” Farmer said when asked about public interest in drug enforcement beyond the opioid crisis. “But we have to remind ourselves that methamphetamine is a tremendously strong, addictive drug and that the state’s appetite for this drug hasn’t ever gone away.”

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Meth labs are gone; meth never left

Meth has long been a widespread problem in Tennessee, but years ago state law enforcement found themselves fighting the war on drugs on their home turf. Between 2002 and 2012, more than 16,000 meth labs were discovered in Tennessee, with many hidden in the state’s rural counties, using the wilderness to cover the foul smoke and stench produced by mixing chemicals. Small-time cooks also were known to mix meth in 2-liter soda bottles — often called the “Shake and Bake” method — which required virtually no lab equipment and could even be done in a moving car.

But, in 2013, state lawmakers enacted strict laws limiting the purchase of cold and allergy medicines containing pseudoephedrine, sometimes called "meth precursors," which are often used as base ingredients in meth labs. Some Tennessee cities went even further, requiring prescriptions for all medicines containing pseudoephedrine.

Almost immediately, Tennessee’s meth trade began to change. Drug dealers who had long been able to buy pseudoephedrine with ease could no longer get the bulk ingredients needed to cook meth. Within two years, the number of meth labs discovered in the state had dropped from hundreds per month to only a few dozen, according to the Tennessee Dangerous Drugs Task Force.

“There were a lot of people who say, ‘Oh, we’ve done it. We won the war on meth,’ ” Farmer said. “But we were very cautious, because we knew we couldn’t do it overnight.”

Soon, it was become apparent that Tennessee hadn’t won any war at all.

Although meth cooks could no longer get enough precursor drugs to run labs, Tennessee still had a strong demand for what had long been its drug of choice. Meanwhile, Mexican cartels that had traditionally trafficked marijuana were now shifting their focus onto meth. Soon, cartel labs were producing meth that was far more potent than anything that had been cooked in Tennessee.

Overdose deaths have been on the rise ever since.

“It kind of was a perfect storm,” said Sgt. Gene Donegan, a narcotics investigator with Metro Nashville Police. “We passed the regulatory laws on Sudafed … and at the same time, the cartels had gotten better with their manufacturing.”

Nowadays, meth flows from cartel labs beyond the reach of American law enforcement, and Tennessee police find themselves shifting focus from small labs hidden in the wilderness to secret smugglers on crisscrossing highways. Sometimes, they intercept huge shipments like that mother lode discovered in Clarksville in June.

“I know there are a couple of busts that have gotten 20 or 30 or 40 pounds,” Donegan said. “Back when people were doing the ‘Shake and Bake’ method, if you caught them with an ounce that was a lot of meth.

"But now, like I said, we’ve got pounds and pounds and pounds of it.”

Brett Kelman is the health care reporter for The Tennessean. He can be reached at 615-259-8287 or at brett.kelman@tennessean.com. Follow him on Twitter at @brettkelman.