-
Wal-Mart Joins the Methamphetamine Wars
Wal-Mart joins the war on methamphetamine by joining other retail stores in moving non-prescription cold and allergy medicines behind the pharmacy counter. These medicines contain a chemical precursor necessary in methamphetamine manufacture.
The Houston Chronicle has the story here:
The world’s largest retailer — which has nearly 4,000 stores in the United States and another 1,600 international locations — will join rivals Target Corp. and Albertson’s Inc. in making such a move throughout all locations.
All three retailers are trying to make it more difficult for customers to easily obtain medications containing pseudoephedrine, which is a key component for making methamphetamine, a powerfully addictive drug. Popular over-the-counter medications such as Sudafed, Sinutab and Afrin nasal spray list pseudoephedrine among their active ingredients.
Wal-Mart, which had already been making the changes, estimates 60 percent of its stores are already selling such abused products behind the counter.
“We will continue with our plan to move the most commonly abused products containing pseudoephedrine behind the pharmacy counter in all our stores by early June,” said Wal-Mart spokeswoman Jacquie Young. “The remaining solid dose products containing multi-ingredients will be moved behind the pharmacy counter by September.”
Wal-Mart had not previously announced a timetable for making the changes.
Young said Wal-Mart has also been in discussions with suppliers “regarding the reformulating of these products with alternative ingredients.” Pfizer is reformulating its entire Sudafed line and expects most of the products to be changed by year’s end.
The move comes as a number of states have imposed restrictions on the sale of some cold medicines, which have resulted in a drop in the number of meth lab seizures. Six states allow only pharmacies to sell drugs with pseudoephedrine, and seven others make retailers lock up the products or sell them from staffed counters. Legislatures in 22 states are considering similar restrictions.
It is estimated the nation has some 1.5 million meth addicts, which represents about 8 percent of the nation’s 19 million drug users. The drug is made by taking over-the-counter cold medicines and boiling them down using highly toxic chemicals to siphon out the pseudoephedrine.
Kudos to Wal-Mart and all of the other stores. This will help eliminate the mom and pop labs.
Now, we need additional federal legislaton and executive enforcement.
-
Woman in Wendy’s finger case eager to face charges
The woman who bit into a manicured finger in a bowl of chili at a San Jose Wendy’s restaurant waived extradition from Las Vegas this morning and will travel to San Jose to face charges of grand larceny in the case. Read the story here:
Anna Ayala, 39, appeared before the same judge who issued a warrant for police to search her home outside Las Vegas on April 6. Records from that raid are sealed.
Outside court, Ayala’s lawyer, Frederick Tait Ehler of San Jose, derided charges against his client as baseless.
“Anna says they’re ridiculous,” Ehler said of the charges of attempted grand larceny. “She’s eager to go back to San Jose.”
Ayala was arrested late Thursday, and San Jose police on Friday called her claim a hoax. Authorities said the attempted grand theft charge relates to millions in dollars of financial losses Wendy’s International Inc. has suffered since news broke of her claim.
Ayala maintains she bit down on a 1{ inch-long finger fragment while dining March 22 with her family at a Wendy’s in San Jose. She has denied placing the digit in her bowl.
She hired a lawyer and filed a claim against the franchise owner, but dropped the legal fight shortly after police searched her home.
Ayala, who has maintained her innocence, faces a maximum seven-year sentence if convicted of the larceny charges, and at least another 16 months if convicted of unrelated charges that she allegedly bilked a woman $11,000 over a soured real estate deal two years ago.
Ayala has been involved in nearly a dozen legal battles, including a sexual harassment suit against an employer, an auto dealer over a car and even another fast-food chain for food poisoning.
Authorities have not yet identified who the finger belonged to or Ayala’s connection to it.
A person with knowledge about the case who spoke on condition of anonymity said the finger charge stemmed from San Jose police interviews with people who said Ayala described putting a finger in the chili, statements bolstered by authorities announcing last week that it did not appear the finger had been simmering in chili.
The company maintains that the finger did not enter the food chain in its ingredients. Employees at the San Jose franchise have all their fingers, and no suppliers of Wendy’s ingredients reported any hand or finger injuries, the company said.
Wendy’s, based at Dublin, Ohio, is offering $100,000 for information leading to the origin of the finger.
The real question is: where did the finger come from? And how did it get in the chili?