Cherokee tribal leaders have launched a war on drugs — primarily caustic home-cooked methamphetamines — but have drawn a sharp distinction between users and drug dealers.

“We are out to help the users get off this stuff. They are not the enemy,” said Cherokee Deputy Marshall Eric Pritchett. “The enemy with the evil intent are those who sell this product that destroys people.”

The distinction is pivotal in the tribe’s war on drugs, which implores Cherokee residents to turn in their friends, neighbors and family members suspected of using drugs.

“Blood is very thick in any community, especially here. But a lot of individuals are taking a different attitude of ‘what is best for my family?’” said Cherokee Chief Michelle Hicks.

Meth, brewed from a conglomerate of household chemicals, literally destroys the body of users from the inside out. Once hooked, few addicts — less than 10 percent — can pry themselves away from the drug on their own, Hicks said.

A rapid increase in methamphetamine use in Cherokee over the last three years prompted Hicks to launch an innovative war on drugs in early 2004, shortly after taking office. The first step was overhauling the police department, which Hicks said was not up to the job under its existing leadership. So he hired a new police chief, Pritchett, who moved here from Memphis in March and was tasked with beefing up the narcotics unit, Hicks said.

By the time he arrived, meth use had become “well-established,” Pritchett said. There was only one narcotics officer, whom Pritchett described as “frankly very overwhelmed.”

Two new narcotics officers with undercover training were added to the police force. All officers are now trained to be on the look out for signs of drug use, whether they are pulling someone over for speeding or responding to a domestic violence call. The tribe is purchasing two drug dogs and training K-9 officers. In the 10 months since Pritchett’s arrival, 137 people have been arrested on various drug charges.

But the community has proven the best tool in fighting drug use. Tips from callers to an anonymous drug hotline resulted in 27 of the 137 arrests made.

Part of Hicks’ anti-drug initiative was the creation of a task force that solicited community clubs, church groups and elders to share concerns and ideas for addressing the drug problem.

“We needed community buy-in,” said Susan Leading Fox, deputy of the health department and a leader on the task force. “The bottom line we heard was that we needed to get tougher on the dealers and the manufacturers. But we’ve made a distinction between your manufacturers and traffickers and your addicts. We need to offer them treatment more so than punishment.”

The philosophical shift has not been easy. Long-standing perceptions of drug addicts as troublemakers have been hard to replace with a new theory that addiction is a disease and should be treated like one, Leading Fox said.

One tool at the tribe’s disposal may be the envy of other communities: banishment. As a sovereign government, the tribe can banish people who prove to be troublemakers from tribal lands. Typically, banishment is reserved for non-Cherokee engaged in repeated criminal activity. But Hicks has called for a three strikes approach that would lead to banishment of tribal members convicted of multiple drug offenses.

Leading Fox said the task force heard support for such a measure when soliciting public input.

“Historically, banishment was a tool that was used for tribal members that were not in line with tribal values and way of living,” Leading Fox said.