Do Not Keep Buying Your Meth Lab Supplies At The Local Walmart
Workers at one particular Walmart in Louisiana are going to notice if you keep buying meth supplies at their store. They've busted two different meth cookers says the Associated Press:
The Wal-Mart worker alerted Slidell police Friday after he saw a man buying material used to make the drug, police spokesman Capt. Kevin Foltz said.People who work at Walmart are on to you, meth $@#holes. You're not only ruining communities, but you're making it really annoying and complicated to buy Sudafed.Officers stopped the man as he left the store parking lot. In his car they found antifreeze, eight packages of 1,000-count matches and 20 tablets of pseudoephedrine, Foltz said.
The man had been under surveillance since neighbors near the suspected lab complained of a strong odor. After investigating, police arrested the man questioned at Wal-Mart and another man at the trailer and booked them with operating a clandestine laboratory to manufacture a controlled dangerous substance, which carries a sentence of five to 15 years.
Meth labs are spreading from rural areas into Slidell, Foltz said.
In August, a Slidell woman was arrested on charges of operating a meth lab out of her car after she was spotted buying drug-making supplies at the same Wal-Mart.
Wal-Mart worker's tip leads to meth lab bust [Journal Gazette]
(Photo:taberandrew)
Attention, Walmart shoppers! This ad is for you! Woo hoo!
Post a comment
Comments:
Odd how Walmart can catch meth labs, but can't remove Nazi t-shirts off their shelves...
Yes ! Yes! HELL YES !
I'm a bail bondsman. I deal with these dirtbags all the time. There is NOTHING they won't do (including stealing the copper wire off of the power pole outside your home to sell for scrap).These people don't need "help" or "rehabilitation".They need to be locked up like animals and forgotten about. Cruel ? You betcha. Here are some other things that are cruel :
Stealing your own kids lunch money and state support payments to buy meth ingredients.
Burning your shit hole double wide down making meth and giving your innocent kids third degree burns over 60-70% of their body (happened here last year)
Stealing honest,hardworking peoples' credit and debit cards and looting their accounts and ruining their finances so you can get high for about 48 hours.
Stealing the identities of your own family members to fool police and stay out of jail so you can get high.
Just so that you know, I won't bond these people out of jail.I won't even take their money.They can die in a fire (and no small number have) and it's fine with me.Bottom line: All of you girlfriends,parents,grandparents "friends" and other enablers are keeping this epidemic going strong.Don't "help" these people,leave them in jail or prison.They deserve nothing less.
True Story: Last week I was in wal mart and bought anti-freeze and sudafed. I guess buying some twinkies and a few hot wheels cars kept my suspicion level low :)
@Snarkysnake: No really, how do you feel about recent reports indicating an increase in the production of-- and addiction by-- methamphetamines in the United States?
Easy solution is to make it legal, let all the morons OD, and let Darwinism take its course.
Come on, snarky, don't hold back. Tell us how you really feel.
Someone who has antifreeze, in a vehicle? Simply unthinkable!
But good job on the catch.
I used to work at a Sheriff's department in Mississippi. Anyone purchasing multiple of the ingredients used in cooking meth were noted by Wal-Mart employees and we received a phone call after they had left the check out register notifying us.
One of the most amusing things was waiting for a rainy/damp day and waiting for calls coming in about exploding double-wides and sheds because the fumes backed up and caused the meth lab to explode.
The people who's houses were on fire and said it was "okay" and they didn't need help were priceless.
I've purchased antifreeze, 20 tablets of pseudoephedrine and matches before. 1000 matches sounds like alot, but that's really just one box of wooden matches. Maybe they should publish a list for non-meth heads so we can avoid suspicion?
um, what is a "double wide"? (for those of us that aren't familiar with the vernacular)
It annoys me so much when I have a cough or the sniffles and have to sign my life away to buy Sudafed or Robitussin.
@DashTheHand:
make it legal to leave an environmental nightmare at an apartment for someone else to unwillingly live in?
@Daniel-Bham: As a former police beat news reporter, my amusement was watching the slimeball white trash wear moonsuits out of Tyvex, then gettting thrown in the back of a paddywagon. Happened in a really nice, upscale neighborhood in North Augusta, S.C., too.
Ptrix -- a double wide is a mobile home that's made up of two towed to the lot and put together... it's a little more like a modular home.
@MountainRooster, @Rptrcub
I think what Dash was saying was that if meth were legal and you could buy it in the store, there wouldn't BE all these labs because there'd be no money in it. Not sure I agree, but I think that's what he/she was saying.
I've been to that walmart....seems to be the only place in town to buy any supplies, meth or otherwise. Small town, cops probably knew the perp by first name.
@tadowguy: Or maybe law abiding citizens should make sure to buy antifreeze, matches and other so-called "meth-making supplies" whenever we buy Sudafed just to show the police that while meth labs are a problem, giving law abiding citizens more trouble is not the solution.
If I have to endure one more cold/flu without effective decongestants (the new OTC replacement, phenylephrine, is shite), I may just have to start a meth habit to get through it.
@HeyHermano: Sure, but how did he end up under surveillance? How long until I am put on some sort of "No Flying List" just b/c I bought the 96-pack of Sudafed?
@krom: They still sell the pseudoephedrine, it's just behind the counter and you have to ask for it and show ID and sometimes sign a sheet of paper.
It makes me annoyed thinking about it now, but when my face is clogged up all I can think of is "gimme gimme gimme gimme".
Ahh, I love it when Louisiana makes Consumerist.....oh wait...scratch that
@ptrix: It's a mobile, or "manufactured" home, usually 28 to 30 feet wide, as opposed to a "single wide - about 12 to 17 feet.
@DashTheHand: See SnarkySnake's post. I'm good with legalizing marijuana, maybe a couple of others, but meth is the Devil's dingleberries. If they would OD by themselves in a corner, fine, but they take their kids, their neighbors, and other innocents with them.
@Troy F.: What law abiding citizens were troubled? If you mean trouble by having to go to the counter to pick up your medicine when you are sick, get over it. In this case, the benefits to society far outweigh your minor wait.
@Javert: Not just going to the counter - presenting ID and signing a form. Last I checked home meth labs are still in business so it has accomplished very little other than annoy law-abiding citizens. As if a backyard meth cooker is going to go to Rite Aid and buy a case of Sudafed using his own real ID.
meth is worse than crack! and thats hard to do. and what law biding citizen is getting harrassed over this? i've botten 2 boxes of sudafed in the last 2 years, never had anyone ever question me.
and as far as having antifreeze stored in your vehicle? whats the point? if your radiator/motor is spewing antifreeze, i doubt pouring more in is going to help, and if you have a leak, i think it would be pretty obvious to an officer once you've popped open your hood.
if you really are going to buy these things, it would just be plain stupid to buy them all together. i would REALLY hope, that you DO get harrassed for doing so as i'd put my life savings on it that it would catch more meth makers than citizens.
and if we were all to buy these things together to make a point, in the same process you just made it easier for everyone who has intent to produce meth to buy these things and get away with it.
i'm a liberal, but i'm all for signing your name for sudafed, and for things like spray paint, to reduce vandalism/and drug use. those who arent braking the law should have nothing to worry about.
I hatehatehate meth addicts.
Most of the drugstores around here no longer keep up a good stock of pseudoephedrine products. I prefer the kind with the ibuprofen/acetominophen plus an antihistamine included, and it's practically impossible to find them anymore
Ironically, they generally *do* have the pills with nothin' but pseudoephedrine--which would seem to me to be making things easy for the meth cookers.
But if I buy *those*, I have to wait a month before I can legally buy the sinus pills that I actually prefer.
In short, I want the methheads to die. Painfully. Preferably by drowning in their own snot.
@Troy F.: Because the neighbors reported a "strong odor". While I personally have never lived next to one, from what I understand, you KNOW when you live next to a meth lab.
It actually sounds like this was a long strain of suspicious behavior but there wasn't enough to actually arrest him. I think we have to give kudos to the police in this case. Sounds like they were on the up and up.
If walmart employees can spot a meth cooker/ dealer & turn him in, then why don't the higher ups not follow the hourly's lead & pay taxes, keep natzi crap off the shelves, pay their employees more, keep dangerous products off the shelves, stop selling recalled items, report recalled/dangerous products like they are supposed to, label their meat properly (country of origin labeling), and the list goes on & on & on & on & on & on......
@RaRaRad: I hate that Robitussin changed its formula and discontinued its liquicaps so I can't get anything that works anymore. My last cold was unbridled hell.
Perhaps the people buying the ingredients isn't the problem here. Maybe its the fact that before Walmart moved into these small towns there wasn't anywhere to buy all of these ingredients at the same time.
@INconsumer: Yeah I'm all for people being strip-searched at airports, movie theatres, and when pulled over for a moving violation.
People who aren't hiding anything shouldn't have anything to worry about.
Seriously - as someone who is reading the consumerist I'm surprised that you would be one for giving authority to the government or a corporation (both becoming hard to distinguish from the other) without complaint.
A meth lab out of her car? Wow.
That is something bad just waiting to happen.
@krom:
Amen, Krom. That phenylephrine does not work for me at all and for some reason each time I've taken it, I end up with a terrible sinus infection.
DayQuil and Sudafed have both been reformulated as have many other brands that I no longer buy.
if you really are going to buy these things, it would just be plain stupid to buy them all together.
@INconsumer: Most people don't go through there day worrying about whether their actions make them look like a drug dealer and/or addict.
Finally, a bails bondsman with principals.
Well done, for choosing what clients you will provide services to, and those that you will not.
Because the WallyWorld employess follow directions very well. The things that you are asking for are corporate decisions which must folow a chain of command up and then back down to the line employee. One slacker in the entire organization and the decision making ability of the company can grind to a halt.
The squealing to Uncle Leo was done outside of the normal chain of command. In this instance a eager employee saw something happen that the employee could do something about.
So many haters. Where's the outrage over Walmart's alerting the police? If I buy a hatchet and a tarp, should I expect them to sic the police on me, "just in case" I was planning to murder someone?
Don't blame meth users or the drug itself because you can't get your Sudafed as easily. You elected the knee-jerk politicians who want to appear "hard on crime".
Meth is an awesome, useful drug. It's one HELL of a decongestant, and is legally available by prescription.
@Snarkysnake: You forgot selling their own 14 year old daughter for drugs.
My county has at least 1,700 open dependency cases at any time related to meth, most of these mothers have several kids by several fathers and the majority of these kids are abused.
Wow, it's really not that hard to buy your decongestant at the counter. I have never had a clerk be rude to me or suggest I was a meth dealer when I buy Claritin. They simply write down my name from my driver's license.
FWIW, I think the OTC Claritin really does work just as well as the -D. So I don't bother with it anymore.
When one of my roommates was pharmtech at a Walgreens in Iowa, they were told to call in anyone who bought sudefed repeatedly who smelled of cat pee, since that's apparently the smell of a meth lab.
Shortly after we left Iowa, and it's "Meth-Free Zones"
Try driving with about 100 propane bottles in your pickup wondering if the cops think you're hauling Anyhydrous Ammonia to your methlab.
The cat pee smell comes from the ammonia which is used as a catalyst. Only reason I know this is because of all the BS you have to go through to get some Anyhydrous for the farm. However, I'm surprised they don't do a full-on background check for stuff like Ammonium Sulfate.
@jesirose: I just buy the pseudoephedrine at the counter and sign my life away, then down the Claritin separately. Or ibuprofen or guafensin (Mucinex) or acetaminophen. I don't care. In order to have free and clear sinuses, I'd sell my soul.
Apparently, not every employee is as vigilant as those at Louisiana Wal-Marts. The machine at the grocery ordered me to show my ID to the clerk manning the self-checkout area when I tried to purchase a two pack of generic Day- and NyQuil recently. I didn't have it (accidentally left my wallet at work), and she just waved her hand and pressed a button to clear the warning.
Of course, I don't have a drug lab, nor do I smell like cat urine, so perhaps she successfully profiled me as someone who just needed some cold meds...
had to get him at the double-wide