By Kristen Kridel and Angela Rozas
The Chicago Tribune
CHICAGO — Chicago police seized drugs worth almost $3 million in a raid on a Northwest Side apartment that authorities said Tuesday resulted in a rare discovery — an apparent methamphetamine lab in the city.
Making the stimulant can result in noxious smells and reddish clouds, so police say such operations usually are set up in the country, where they’re less likely to attract neighbors’ notice.
But when officers executed a search warrant in the Belmont Cragin neighborhood about 9:30 p.m. Monday, they found 9 kilograms of methamphetamine and 790 grams of cocaine, Sgt. Richard Sliva said.
Sergio Echevarria, who lived at the apartment in the 2500 block of North Linder Avenue, was charged with several felonies, including making methamphetamine and manufacturing and delivering cocaine.
“There were nine trays of methamphetamine that were in the drying process,” Sliva said. “But they had all the material that was used to cook it there. They had a stove there.”
The search warrant resulted from an investigation, Sliva said, but he would not indicate how long the apartment was under surveillance.
Sgt. Mark Marianovich, a SWAT coordinator for Chicago police, said his team was called in to help handle the confiscation and has helped on a handful of meth lab cases in the city in the last few years. The meth was in the “finishing stages,” he said, getting ready for packaging for sale, he said.
Still, he said meth labs in Chicago remain somewhat rare.
“It’s not a regular occurrence in the city,” Marianovich said.
That’s because stricter laws in recent years have limited access to the materials needed to make meth, he said. Also, it’s harder to hide a meth lab in the city, as compared to rural areas where law enforcement officers have seen more of them in recent years.
The process requires a large quantity of toxic and potentially explosive chemicals, the labs have to be well-ventilated to prevent explosions, and the makers have to have a place to dump the toxic byproducts and chemicals afterward, he said.
“Here in the city, you’re not going to dump it in a trash can,” Marianovich said.
The labs often produce noxious smells or reddish clouds of chemicals that neighbors might detect, he said.
Although police were not certain that the meth confiscated Monday underwent the entire production process at the Chicago apartment, the operation is considered a meth lab because chemicals and materials used in the making and drying were found there, Marianovich said.
Echevarria also is charged with unlawful use of a weapon and possession of a firearm by a felon, Officer John Mirabelli said.
A TEC-9 pistol was found in the apartment.
Copyright 2008 The Chicago Tribune