By Lindsay Tice,Staff Writer
The discovery of an alleged toxic meth lab stuns a Lewiston neighborhood, but residents have no plans to flee.

LEWISTON – Tom Larochelle knew something was wrong when his upstairs neighbor asked to store a 400-pound tank of ammonium nitrate in his garage.

“I said, No, I don’t think so,'” Larochelle said Friday. “I didn’t want to get involved. I’m not stupid.”

Then there was the constant stream of strange visitors, even at night. And a small explosion that rained debris from the second-floor apartment onto Larochelle’s back porch.

So when police and drug agents raided the 624 Sabattus St. apartment, saying it housed a dangerous and potentially toxic meth lab, Larochelle wasn’t surprised.

He was scared.

“Little neighborhood like this? You aren’t safe anywhere,” he said.

Still in the shadow of Wednesday afternoon’s meth raid, the first in Lewiston-Auburn, Larochelle and his neighbors lamented society, addiction-driven crimes and drugs. But even as they recalled how drug agents in protective suits invaded their sleepy slice of the city, none planned to leave.

“It’s a good neighborhood here,” said Leo Renaud, who has lived next to the apartment building for 42 years.

Fire and meth

Police discovered the suspected meth lab in a second-floor apartment on the corner of Sabattus and Laurier streets and arrested the two people who lived there Wednesday. Louis Rubino, 25, and Donna Pagnani, 23, were each charged with manufacturing and trafficking in methamphetamine, an increasingly popular illegal stimulant. Pagnani was also charged with endangering the welfare of her 3-year-old daughter, who lived with the couple.

As part of the investigation, police went to 37 Goff St. in Auburn where they arrested 37-year-old Joseph May. At that apartment, police said they found an ammonia tank and other evidence of meth manufacturing. May was charged with aggravated trafficking

In retrospect, Rubino and Pagnani’s neighbors said, the clues were everywhere.

Strangers went in and out of the Lewiston apartment at all hours. There was that 400-pound tank filled with a volatile chemical often used in the making of methamphetamine. And Larochelle and his family noticed they were getting sore throats whenever Rubino was home.

Chemicals used to brew meth are toxic and can cause sore throats, among other symptoms, when inhaled.

“We kept smelling stuff, and we couldn’t figure out what the heck it was,” Larochelle said.

Things came to a head about two weeks ago when there was a small explosion, neighbors said. Curtains in Rubino’s apartment caught fire, and debris fell onto Larochelle’s porch below.

Neighbors finally called the landlord. Police said the landlord never called them, but they did receive a tip about the apartment.

On Wednesday, they swarmed the area. Fearing toxic chemicals, they evacuated the building and sent four people to the hospital, including Pagnani’s young daughter.

Next door, Fleurange Renaud and her husband, Leo, both 83, watched it all from their kitchen window. The old, quiet neighborhood was in a frenzy.

“There were all kinds of rumors. Someone said somebody was dead,” Fleurange Renaud said.

Police would tell them only that no one had died. Reassured, they left to play cards.

When they came back, the road was blocked off and police were donning head-to-toe hazard suits.

“It was like TV, with the white suits and everything,” Renaud said.

Hopefully, that’s it’

One of the officers used Roger Morin’s nearby barber shop to change into his hazard suit. Morin, who owned the shop for 15 years, watched the raid with disbelief.

“It’s kind of shocking, really. You don’t expect it up here,” he said.

Morin wasn’t scared, however. And even though police said they found the Twin Cities’ first meth lab just steps from his front door, he didn’t plan to move. He wasn’t worried about the future.

“Hopefully, that’s it,” he said.

Larochelle, who lived directly below the raided apartment, called the situation “surreal” and “nerve-racking.”

Meth’s national prevalence scared him, but he wasn’t going to let the raid send him packing.

“It’s all said and done here,” he said.

Fleurange and Leo Renaud were a little more concerned.

“I’m glad I didn’t know about the lab before that. I would have worried sick,” Fleurange. Renaud said.

But, like Morin and Larochelle, they didn’t plan to leave because of it.

They couldn’t imagine where they would go.

“There’s no place safe,” Fleurange Renaud said.

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