Low-speed chase leads police to meth lab

Herald staff

MARYSVILLE — Three people were arrested and three children were turned over to state Child Protective Services after a traffic stop led police to a methamphetamine laboratory.

The incident began when an officer tried to make a traffic stop about 10 p.m. Thursday in the area of 46th Drive and 88th Street, Cmdr. Rob Lamoureux said Friday. The car led the officer on a brief, low-speed pursuit that ended when the car pulled into a residence on 46th Drive, he said. A passenger in the car bolted from the vehicle and ran to the back of the house. The officer arrested the other two occupants of the car, who later were released.

The driver gave police permission to search the car. In the trunk, officers found precursor chemicals used to make methamphetamine.

While police were searching the car, a woman arrived who said she lived in the house with her three children, ages about 8 to 15, Lamoureux said. She called them out, using a police loudspeaker. An officer had heard the children talking to the man who fled from the car. He then voluntarily came out of the house and was arrested on Everett police warrants, as well as in connection with the chemicals in the car, Lamoureux said.

The woman allowed police to search the house, where they found an active meth lab in the garage and a small amount of meth, he said. Officers left the house and obtained a search warrant, he said.

Snohomish Regional Narcotics Task Force agents spent about four hours dismantling the lab on Friday.

Detectives arrested the woman and her boyfriend, and they were booked into Snohomish County Jail on investigation of manufacture of methamphetamine, Lamoureux said. Another person was booked on the same charges.

The house cannot be reoccupied until it has been examined and approved by the Snohomish Health District.