Hotels Become Home Base for Illegal Drug Labs : Toxics: Poisonous residues linger long after manufacturing has ceased, creating liabilities and health hazards for those who have unknowingly owned or occupied a tainted former lab site.

Room 219 at the La Quinta Inn has a longstanding “do not disturb” status resulting from an alleged methamphetamine laboratory flash fire that has contaminated the area with hazardous waste, county public health officials said.

“No one, not even our top-level employees, can go in there,” said Christine Jelen, a spokeswoman for the San Antonio, Tex., hotel chain. Jelen said the room will remain untouched until the county health department completes tests of chemical samples taken after the Feb. 28 fire, at which time a private firm will be hired to remove hazardous substances.

But in terms of contamination, Room 219 is not the worst, said authorities heading the cleanup, who have seen methamphetamine production sites so saturated with toxic chemicals that portions of the building had to be torn down. “This incident was more dramatic because the lab caught fire,” said Robert Merryman, director of the Orange County Environmental Health Division. “But they didn’t leave behind a lot of chemicals because they weren’t there for very long.”

Pasquale Paduano, director of emergency services for Disposal Control Service, an Upland-based firm specializing in hazardous waste removal, is well-versed in the devastating effects that prolonged methamphetamine production can have on a building. The company averages one drug-related chemical cleanup per day, he said, adding that the firm is also handling the La Quinta Inn cleanup.

“These labs are designed for secrecy, not safety, and they tend to be real messy,” Paduano said. “There have been times when we’ve had to take everything out of a house--including the kitchen sink--because the entire place was contaminated.”

In many cases, he explained, poisonous residues from toxic chemicals in the illegal drug labs linger long after manufacturing operations have ceased, creating liabilities and health hazards for those who have unknowingly owned or occupied a tainted, former lab site.

Damages include chemical-stained walls, ceilings and floors; acid that has seeped into wood, carpet and furniture, and toxic byproducts of the drug-making process that are illegally dumped in back yards or in rural areas, Paduano said.

Law enforcement agencies in the more remote areas of Riverside and San Bernardino counties have reported a higher incidence of methamphetamine labs than Orange and Los Angeles counties because rural labs make it difficult for noxious, drug-cooking odors to be detected by neighbors.

However, many of the lab operators merely commute from Orange County and Los Angeles to the outlying areas, said Harry Smith, hazardous materials technician for the San Bernardino County Environmental Health Department.

Last year, out of 400 methamphetamine labs seized statewide, 30 were in Orange County, while more than 100 were in Riverside and San Bernardino counties, according to figures from the California Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement.

The 48-hour process to make a batch of methamphetamines uses a combination of about a dozen acids, solvents and base chemicals that are combined with ephedrine, a pharmaceutical chemical used in nasal decongestants, according to information from the federal Drug Enforcement Administration.

When the acids are cooked in a lab, toxic vapors emitted from the brew have been known to corrode the metal in building ventilation systems or ruin sewer pipes if poured down a drain, Merryman said.

And the solvents, which are used to convert a liquid mixture of the drug to the crystalline form sold on the streets, include carcinogens that can cause permanent damage to the respiratory system, he added.

Investigators think the Costa Mesa hotel room was being used for the conversion process, rather than the cooking process, because they found a microwave oven and bottles containing solvents, said DEA agent Debora Podkowa.

Podkowa noted the tendency for illegal drug lab operators to use temporary quarters such as motels and rental properties, where they can set up equipment and use dangerous chemicals without contaminating their own homes.

Because of this, unsuspecting property owners are often saddled with thousands of dollars in toxic cleanup bills, said Vince Sternjacob, supervisor of the hazardous materials branch of the Riverside County Health Department.

“I remember a landlord from Orange County who found out that the people renting his house (in Riverside) had been busted,” Sternjacob said. “When he got to the place, there were hypodermic needles all over the yard, drums of chemicals in the garage and hazardous wastes everywhere.”

In another case, which Sternjacob declined to discuss in detail because it involves a lawsuit pending against Riverside County, children digging in a back yard became ill because toxic, drug-related byproducts had been dumped there by a previous tenant.

Privacy laws protecting the rights of hotel guests and rental property tenants also help shield drug labs, because the hotel management or landlord cannot enter uninvited unless they have a reasonable suspicion that illegal activities are being conducted, said San Francisco attorney Jim Abrams, who acts as legal counsel to the California Hotel & Motel Assn.

“Even if a guest hadn’t come out of his room in a long time, usually someone will call them from the front desk to see if everything is all right,” Abrams said. “It’s a very ticklish circumstance, and the hotel is often the innocent victim.”

Costa Mesa Police Detective Robert B. Phillips, a narcotics officer who said last week’s drug lab seizure was the third one in the city since 1987, said hotel and motel operators are told to be on the alert for guests who request a secluded room, no maid service and who may be toting laboratory glassware.

“These people go in and thrash places,” Podkowa said. “I’ve seen chemicals dripping from the walls. Sometimes they are so chemically contaminated themselves that we go in (on a bust) and find them in a stupor.”

On occasion, respirator masks used by pesticide sprayers and painters are found at the labs, but for the most part, drug-makers do not use protective gear, she added.

“I’ve been in places where people would use the living room to do their ‘cooks,’ and then young children would play on the carpet afterward,” said a DEA agent on drug surveillance cases, who asked that his name be withheld.