Cartel built Maine, N.H. meth markets by making it strong, and selling it cheap

Inset, "El Chapo" Guzman after his arrest in Mexico in 2016. )Courtesy photo)

Editor's note: The Rochester Voice publishes the second of its three-part series delving into a disturbing spike in the use of methamphetamine, a singularly pernicious drug that ravages the brain and leaves users unable to find any joy in this world except in its increased use. Today a look at how the world's most powerful drug cartel is targeting Maine and New Hampshire as it seeks to build a new marketplace for its deadly wares.

Folks who live in the Northern Seacoast may think the evil, murderous doings of the Mexican drug cartel formerly headed by "El Chapo" Guzman has no connection to Rochester or Dover or Sanford, Maine.

But in fact, their presence is felt in just about every large city in New Hampshire and Maine, where the Sinaloa Cartel distributes more methamphetamine than any other New England state, said Timothy Desmond, a DEA special agent and spokesman.

The Rochester Voice began its investigation into the use of meth in and around Rochester after Rochester Police reported a significant increase in the calls for suspected meth use last month. That was followed by February indictments that showed nine meth-use and meth-trafficking indictments, a third more than handed down on fentanyl trafficking and possession arrests.

The reason behind the increase is a huge influx of meth coming in from the U.S. southwest border and heading straight to New Hampshire and Maine, said Desmond.

"They (Sinaloa Cartel) are taking advantage of a new demand by flooding the market with cheap meth to basically build demand," he said.

And there's a lot of money to be made here, Desmond noted.

For instance last July an ounce of meth bought in Sinaloa province in Mexico went for $240. When it got to Tijuana it brought $400; and by the time it had been smuggled across the border to San Diego, Calif., the price had spiked to $1,200.

The Sinaloa Cartel, considered by U.S. intelligence officials "the most powerful drug trafficking organization in the world," was formerly headed by Guzman, who is now imprisoned at a supermax federal correctional facility in Colorado.

Desmond said the cartel got into the meth making and trafficking enterprise when they learned the same precursor materials supplied them by China to make fentanyl and other synthetic opiates could also be used to make meth.

Once the meth gets shipped across the country, Dominican gangs handle distribution throughout New Hampshire and Maine, Desmond said.

Methamphetamines, known as meth or crystal meth on the street, wreaks havoc on the brain, releasing abnormal amounts of dopamine, a naturally occurring neurotransmitter that makes us feel good about ourselves when we accomplish something.

That particular kind of high often makes a user hyperactive, hyper-alert, even euphoric, confident, talkative and feeling "on top of the world," said Nathan Cermelj of Scarborough, Maine, a former longtime meth user.

"After the second use I was hooked," Cermelj said recently. "It was a great feeling. It gave me all the things I wanted: energy, better self-esteem. And it was cheap."

Desmond said it made sense for the Sinaloa cartel to pour cheap, powerful meth into Maine and New Hampshire.

"That's how they make a market," he said. "They flood the market, they're sending in strong crystal meth."

After a period of time in which dopamine delivers feelings of euphoria, it destroys the receptors that naturally produce it, leaving users unable to feel any joy, a condition called anhedonia, also known as a world "gone gray."

But drug traffickers have no problem with that, because the only way to beat the blues is to use more meth.

Next Monday: A drug recovery center director and former longtime meth user recalls his life as a machete-bearing drug trafficker who was going downhill fast before he made a vow he wasn't going to let it destroy his life.