In what could be described as a scene out of the AMC show Breaking Bad, two chemistry professors were accused of making methamphetamine in a school lab, sheriff’s deputies said.
Terry David Bateman, 45, and Bradley Allen Rowland, 40, who both worked at Henderson State University in Arkadelphia, Arkansas, as associate professors of chemistry were arrested Friday afternoon, the Clark County Sheriff’s Department said in a statement.
Bateman and Rowland face charges of manufacturing meth and using drug paraphernalia, and have been on administrative leave since October 11, KTRK reported.
Staff closed the university science center on October 8 after someone noticed a chemical odor, according to Tina Hall, the university’s associate vice president of marketing and communications.
The university reopened the building on October 29 after an on-call environmental service installed air filtering systems and temporarily removed windows to facilitate ventilation, Hall said.
Hall could not confirm what was found after the mysterious odor report or whether the professors made the meth inside the school.
An investigation into the incident is ongoing.
Breaking Bad aired between 2008 and 2013, and told the story of Walter White, a high school chemistry teacher who began making crystal meth as a way to make money for his family after he was diagnosed with lung cancer.