AREA METHAMPHETAMINE LABS TARGETED.Byline: Bhavna Mistry Daily News Staff Writer Hoping to curtail an illicit yet growing industry, city, county and state officials announced Friday the creation of a four-agency task force to target methamphetamine labs in the Antelope and Santa Clarita valleys. In order to concentrate solely on a problem that is becoming more violent, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department This article is about the Los Angeles County Sherriff's Department, not to be confused with the smaller Los Angeles County Police The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department (LASD) is a local law enforcement agency that serves Los Angeles County, California. , the Department of Justice's Bureau of Narcotics narcotics n. 1) techinically, drugs which dull the senses. 2) a popular generic term for drugs which cannot be legally possessed, sold, or transported except for medicinal uses for which a physician or dentist's prescription is required. and LA Impact have joined forces with Lancaster to open an office in that city. ``We won't stand idly by and allow the illegal drug industry to flourish in the AntelopeValley,'' said Lancaster Mayor Frank Roberts Frank Roberts may refer to:
The latest task force is a break-off from a countywide multijurisdictional anti-drug agency called LA IMPACT. The breakaway agency is called Allied Emergency Response Team (ALERT). One ALERT task force unit already is operating in the Los Angeles Basin The Los Angeles Basin is the coastal sediment-filled plain located between the peninsular and transverse ranges in southern California in the United States containing the central part of the city of Los Angeles as well as its southern and southeastern suburbs (both in Los Angeles . The newly formed one is concentrating on the Antelope and Santa Clarita valleys. Four law enforcement officials - two from the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department and two from the state Justice Department - are being supported by a three-member clerical team. Although the team has been training and operating since the beginning of July, it will have a new office Monday, courtesy of the city of Lancaster The City of Lancaster (2002 population: 133,914) is a local government district with city status in Lancashire, England. Its main town is Lancaster, from which it obtained its city status. Other towns in the district include Morecambe, Heysham, Slyne, and Carnforth. . Local operation will cut down the response time, officials said. Officials said the number of drug labs discovered in the Antelope Valley This article is about the Los Angeles County region. For the census-designated place in Wyoming, see Antelope Valley-Crestview, Wyoming. The Antelope Valley has continued to grow in the past three years. In 1996, there were 12 labs found in the Antelope Valley. Seventeen were found in 1997 and 15 have been discovered so far this year including four that were found in one day, one at the scene of a homicide and one found Thursday. Los Angeles Los Angeles (lôs ăn`jələs, lŏs, ăn`jəlēz'), city (1990 pop. 3,485,398), seat of Los Angeles co., S Calif.; inc. 1850. County authorities have been able to close 256 labs between July 1997 and July 1998. More than 900 methamphetamine labs were dismantled in California in 1997. Officials said that while there are many drug labs in the Los Angeles Basin, the labs tend to be bigger and more productive in the Antelope Valley. ``Labs we are seizing here are much larger,'' said John Ogden John Ogden can refer to:
``Other drugs are manufactured elsewhere and imported here,'' Ogden said. ``But with methamphetamine you have everything here - the manufacturing, distributing, use and the children exposed to it.'' Partial funding for the task force came from a $300,000 federal grant to pay for overtime, equipment and training. CAPTION(S): Photo PHOTO Tom Holeman, a Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department detective, shows materials used at illicit methamphetamine laboratories. Shaun Dyer/Special to the Daily News |
|
||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion