Smurfs are those cute little blue creatures created by the Belgium cartoonist Peyo in 1958. The word "Smurf" actually began when Peyo was having lunch with his French friend and he momentarily forgot the word "salt" and asked for the "schtroump" , a word he made up that he believed sounded like French for salt. His friend passed him the salt and told him that when he was finished "schtrouping" to pass it back. They spent the day "schtrouping" and it caught on later translated in Dutch as "Smurf" and he then used it to describe his blue creature cartoon - the rest is history. Today the word is used as a verb with just about anything that is blue, such as dying something blue, the use of the blue car wash soap or buying those blue coated cold tablets.
Within the drug scene, it is used to describe the person or persons purchasing the one main ingredient in making methamphetamine. Pseudoephedrine is an ingredient in legal pharmaceuticals, but the concern over use in producing meth crystal meth has led to laws which limit buyers to a small number of visits. An individual, or teams, who is (are) "smurfing" will travel to multiple stores buying the legal limit each time in order to mass a large quantity. This name reportedly comes from the blue color of the bubble packed pills. A pack of the legal pills sell for approximately $5, but will bring up to $50, or more, to the meth cook or lab.
There are many meth recipes easily obtained over the Internet and every one contain that special ingredient of pseudoephedrine. Anyone with a minimum of cooking skills can cook up a batch of crystal meth with simple common kitchen utensils. The recipe requires that the blue pills be reduced to a powder and mixed at a low temperature with solvent and filtered to remove inert materials in the pill. Then the pure pseudoephedrine is mixed with red phosphorus and hydriodic acid. More filtering is required to take out the red phosphorus and the remaining solution is then neutralized with a lye solution. A substance is added to blend the mixture and then it is "cooked" by hydrogen chloride making it crystalline salt. This is the dangerous part and some cook stoves blow up and the fumes are dangerous to breath in. It is again filtered and left to dry. Many meth labs are uncovered either by the neighbors smelling the fumes or the explosion of the cook stoves.
The price of crystal meth varies from state to state and city to city. Crystal meth addiction will cost as much as the person is willing to give. What price is a person willing to pay for crystal meth addiction? A home? A family? Friends? Health? Or life? On average, the price of crystal meth for a 1/4 of gram is $20. ½ of gram of crystal meth is $40 and 1 gram is $80. A 16th (which is a gram and 3/4 of a gram) is around $120.00 and an 8 ball which is 3 ½ grams is $200.00. One batch can bring in thousands of dollars for the cooks. Most labs today are small "shake and bake" and mobile in vans and even cars. Is it a problem in Florida? Answer is "yes".
Senator Bill Montford, D-Tallahassee, recently opened a new office in Marianna and in October 2011 held a meeting with law enforcement about the growing meth problem in the area of Jackson, Liberty, Gadsden and Calhoun Counties. Jackson County Sheriff Lou Roberts told Montford that his officers on any given Tuesday could sit in front of a big box store and watch the same scene unfold numerous times; a car full of people leave a vehicle one at a time, each going into the store to buy pseudoephedrine-containing cold pills. The pills are not sold by prescription but are logged and monitored. An individual can buy 9 grams per month enough to keep a person high for 16 days if used to make crystal meth. In most cases, Sheriff Roberts said, the money used to buy the pills initially come from theft of property throughout the county. He added that in most cases checking the pharmacy records will lead to a meth lab in the county. LE officials told Montford that addiction comes quickly for meth users. A defendant once described the first-time high on meth as, "1000 times better than sex." A addict’s life becomes centered around meth use. The powerful pharmaceutical lobby has prevented more strict laws on the sale of pseudoephedrine-containing cold pills. Bottom line is that "smurfing" will remain a lucrative business in Florida.
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