How does a person generally wind up in this position? I doubt there's anyone going into their undergrad years with the intention of getting an organic chemistry degree for the sake of illegal drug synthesis, so how do they make their way there? What are the inroads and opportunities that come up along the way that leads someone to this line of work, I'd imagine a hell of a lot of it is just knowing the right people, but I don't know how you would even begin to get turned on to the right people to uncover an organization that needs cooks.
I remember hearing, and this would make sense, that university faculty will occasionally hear of some of their graduate students being approached by members of illicit organizations to cook for them, it all sounds literally like some shit out of Breaking Bad in the way Gus found Gale to cook for him, giving out chemistry scholarships and the like to draw in a promising young individual willing to get his hands dirty. I feel like this would be a dream come true for individuals that love risk
Some could probably get by with a high school level AP chemistry class. My old chemistry teacher from over ten yrs ago recently told me she retired because she realized she was teaching her students to make meth. Students would ask obvious questions, she would hear them whispering about it, it seemed to be their motivation at times for class, and she just couldnt do it anymore. She was an awesome teacher too, its kind of a shame. Meth is pretty huge in my area so it doesn't surprise me one bit and this was all talked about after I mentioned finding a lab in the woods not too far from her home.