“Shake and Bake” – the New Meth Threat

Meth users no longer have to pony up cash to their favorite drug dealer – they can now do a quick home brew without the former need for a kitchen or garage lab to cook the product.

Remember the griping of all of us who suffer from sinus and allergy problems about having to stand in line and show ID to purchase pseudofed every month? Well, despite the illicit trafficking of bulk pseudofed from suppliers overseas and ingress through our porous southern borders, meth manufacturers were also somewhat inconvenienced and set about to resolve the problem and lower production costs.

The new home brew method uses only small amounts of pseudofed, a 2 liter pop bottle, some common and poisonous chemicals, a few shakes and you get heat, pressure, crystal meth and a noxious brown slurry which you can discard with the pop bottle—no need to worry about bulk waste disposal. Heck, you can even do this while driving and get enough for a few doses out of one mix—if everything goes precisely as planned.

Apparently, actions and timing are most critical here since there are rapidly increasing reports of explosions, fires and severe injuries using Shake and Bake. The old kitchen labs were a little safer it seems since you had a bit of warning and could run like heck. With Shake and Bake you are holding the lab in your hands and near your face!

Warning to Community Clean Up Crews: Never attempt to pick up a “puffy” soda bottle since it could explode—and never open a bottle with a brown liquid inside since the contents are highly poisonous. Alert LE when these bottles start appearing in your community and try to get the tag # when you see one pitched from a vehicle.