Two Chemistry Professors Arrested for Allegedly Cooking Meth in Arkansas
Written by SOURCE on November 18, 2019
Two chemistry professors have been watching too much Breaking Bad, apparently.
Terry David Bateman and Bradley Allen Rowland were arrested Friday for making methamphetamine, according to KATV. The pair, who both work as associate professors of chemistry at Arkansas’ Henderson State University, are facing charges of manufacturing methamphetamine and using drug paraphernalia.
Henderson State University spokeswoman Tina Hall said that the two professors have been on administrative leave since Oct. 11, according to Arkansas Online. She confirmed that after tests, benzyl chloride was found in the labs the professors worked within. There were reports of a chemical odor inside the university’s science center, which closed on Oct. 8.
The pair aren’t the first to try and recreate the magic from the hit series. A 74-year-old college professor and her 29-year-old son tried to do the exact same thing and were subsequently caught back in 2011. The mother and son duo were facing charges of “distribution of meth, conspiracy to violate the drug law, and drug violation in a school zone” at the time.
The show is still just as popular as when it first came out. El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie drew some 6.5 million viewers in its first few days on Netflix. El Camino writer and director Vince Gilligan explained his thought process behind the film in an October interview.
“But basically, over the years it started to percolate in my brain,” Gilligan said. “And when you couple that with the fact that Aaron Paul is one of the best actors in the world and one of the sweetest people to boot, and I knew I wanted to work with him again—those two things were powerful inducements indeed. And I figured, ‘Why not to do this as a movie?'”