AUGUSTA, Maine — State public safety officials are warning people picking up bottles along Maine roads to be careful, citing a rampant increase in methamphetamine production in the state.
The Maine Drug Enforcement Agency has responded to 86 “meth incidents” during the first six months of 2016, according to public safety Commissioner John Morris. There were just 56 such cases in all of 2015. Those incidents include physical meth lab discoveries, as well as “mobile” labs.
More than half of this year’s incidents involved the discovery of “dump sites,” where items used in methamphetamine production are left behind. Morris said 44 dump sites have been discovered in 2016. At these sites, investigators usually find plastic soda bottles containing residue left behind by meth production, as well as containers of products used in that process.
Anyone picking up bottles on the side of the road or plucking them from trash cans is urged to look for white residue or other substances that don’t look like soda, Maine Department of Public Safety spokesman Stephen McCausland said in a Tuesday news release. A bottle that appears to have expanded from its normal size also could be a clue indicting it was used in meth production.
If a person finds suspicious containers, they’re urged not to handle the item but instead call police. Touching or handling the bottles or other objects at a dump site could be hazardous.
“MDEA has a specially trained team that gathers and processes evidence from the sites, with an average cost of $3,000 for a meth lab and $500 for a dump site,” McCausland said.
Follow Nick McCrea on Twitter at @nmccrea213.