DECATUR - Four adults were arrested at 5:39 p.m. Tuesday by Decatur police officers serving a narcotics search warrant at a house in the 2400 block of East North Street, where a methamphetamine laboratory was found in the basement.

Bonds of $200,000 each were set Wednesday in Macon County Circuit Court for two of the adults, a 26-year-old man and a 28-year-old woman. Two men, ages 21 and 31, also were jailed but did not appear in court records Wednesday.

Two children, ages 2 and 3, were inside the house when officers arrived and two other children, ages 6 and 9, arrived home a short time later, said Lt. David Dickerson of the Decatur Police Department Criminal Investigations Division.

The children were removed from the house, examined at a local hospital and placed in the care of the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services.

The adults are held for investigation of aggravated participation in methamphetamine manufacturing, a Class X felony punishable by 15 to 60 years in prison if convicted. The presence of the children in the house is the aggravating factor.

Deputy Police Chief Todd Walker said Wednesday that a total of 1,157 grams of meth was seized, having an estimated street value of $115,000. He said officers found significant amounts of the drug in various stages of production, including finished product, product being "cooked" and product being prepared for consumption and distribution.

The East North Street house was deemed unfit for further occupancy by city inspectors, and the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency was to be contacted about the future of the structure, Walker said.

Walker said there is no lingering chemical risk to other area residents.

According to sworn statements filed in circuit court Wednesday by police detective Rick Hughes, a search of the 26-year-old man revealed a plastic bag containing 1.1 grams of a white powder that field tested positive for methamphetamine.

Hughes said the woman told officers she and her 2-year-old son had been living in the house for the past week. He said she indicated she knew one of the male occupants was a methamphetamine dealer and cook and had seen him breaking sinus pills out of blister packs and putting them in a plastic sandwich bag. She said she knew the pills were used to make meth.

The woman stated she did not know there was any type of methamphetamine lab in the residence, Hughes said.

When detectives and the department's Emergency Response Team members entered the house, they were wearing breathing apparatus, Hughes said. The smell of chemicals from the lab was very strong in the house, and it would have been impossible not to know chemicals were being used there, he said.

Ron Ingram can be reached at ringram@herald-review.com or 421-7973.