White Supremacist + Black Gang Member = Meth

Richard Treis is the very picture of white supremacist meth lord.

​Christine Byers over at the Post-Dispatch has the amazing story of crime union between an avowed white supremacist eagerly going into business with a black gang member in order to circumvent the federal laws regarding the purchase of cold medicine so they could use the pseudoephedrine to make meth.

Richard Treis, the white supremacist -- his milky eye will haunt your dreams -- was the meth producer while Robert "Biz" Swinney was the decongestant procurer. Swinney had an already proven method of circumventing the buy limits by paying relatives and friends to stand outside drug stores and offer people $20 to buy a $10 box and then keep the change. He could then sell the boxes at a steep mark-up to Treis -- often $50 to $80 for the box. Undercover agents observed him acquiring 200 boxes in just two months. What a businessman!

And that's also the compelling part of this whole procedure.
Swinney used friends, relatives, gang associates, homeless folks and random strangers to buy the stuff. It's the random people who intrigue me. What were they thinking? A guy offers you $10 to buy cold medicine, and you just do it, because you're going in there anyway?

If you were in an airport and someone made the same offer, you'd immediately be suspicious and get a cop or TSA over there to do something because you'd be afraid he's making a bomb -- probably one for your plane, knowing your luck. But because you're on the street, and hey, $10, you're willing to become part of the drug chain in Missouri.

And lest you think the buyers were all in North St. Louis, the Post story has a sidebar that lists the top ten sellers of cold medicine in Missouri. Fenton shows up three times, Webb City makes the list twice in the ten spot is held down by a CVS in Creve Coeur.