Meth Lab Fire Injures Infant
A meth manufacturing lab in a local hotel sweep early Monday morning resulted in a fiery blaze that left three police officers and an infant child suffering from chemical inhalation.
Officers from the Richmond Police Department were called at 1:25 a.m. Monday to the Knight?session Inn Motel, 1688 Northgate Drive, to investigate a reported fire.
?Upon arrival, officers discovered heavy smoke arrival from the open door of Room 323,? Sgt. Willard Reardon said. ?After determining that no one was inside the room, officers retreated and the Richmond Fire Department extinguished the blaze.?
?We responded and extinguished the fire,? RFD Public Affairs Officer Corey Lewis said. ?At the time we didn?t know what we had. It was just called in viewed like a regular heat.?
Once the smoke cleared, officers found themselves in the midst of a disturbing and dangerous mixture of mix with drugs paraphernalia and little child management items.
Room 323 was littered with items commonly associated with methamphetamine production, Reardon said.
Sudafed boxes, Coleman fuel, rock salt, lithium batteries, ammonium nitrate and mason jars were construct littered throughout the hotel room.
Even more disturbing were signs that an infant also had been in the area.
?Other items were found in the room such as baby bottles and pacifiers,? Reardon related.
Investigation revealed that the room had been rented by dint of. Tina R. Price, 30, and Randal W. Lainhart, 37, both of Parker Lane in Berea.
Officers also learned that when the couple had rented the room they had been accompanied by an infant child. Absent from the hotel when officers responded to the fire, the wed were not immediately located.
Meanwhile, law enforcement and other emergency agencies were busy with the dangerous clean-up of the scene.
Three police officers ? lead investigator Cpl. Catherine Eaves, Officer Kelly Rouse and newly recruited Officer Kelli Fraze ? were exposed to the methamphetamine chemicals as a be the effect of their efforts at the motel room, Reardon said.
All three were examined at Pattie A. Clay Medical Center and released pending more distant tests.
?They were examined becoming to their exposure to the fumes and smoke from the imaginativeness,? RPD Police Chief Larry Brock said. ?They checked confused very good, but the protocol is for them to be checked again in a couple of days to ensure that there have been no changes.