Drug Bust Turns Up 6 Barrels of Medical Waste

Six large drums of infectious medical waste were discovered in a Carson-area garage during a cocaine bust and were traced to a neighboring kidney dialysis clinic, officials said Friday. The drums were found by Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies and Hawthorne, Gardena and El Segundo police officers serving a narcotics warrant at a home Thursday night.

Along with half an ounce of cocaine, they found the six 100-gallon drums, some of which contained blood, stored in the garage of the house in the 20000 block of South Budlong Avenue in an unincorporated area of Carson, Sheriff’s Deputy Van Mosley said.

The waste material was being stored in the garage by the Biomedical South Bay Dialysis Center, a nearby private clinic at 1123 W. Carson St. that is operated by the owner of the Budlong house.

Hazardous materials investigators from the county Department of Health Services were handling the investigation of the drums.

Six Carson-area men were arrested in the cocaine bust. They were booked on suspicion of possessing cocaine for sale and held on $5,000 bail each at the sheriff’s Carson Station, Deputy Hal Grant said.