Cannabis worth $1M ‘in storage’

Press, 12 October 1976, Page 28

Cannabis worth $1M ‘in storage’

A claim that there must be SIM worth of cannabis sticks in cold storage somewhere between Christchurch and Auckland was quoted in the Christchurch Magistrate’s Court yesterday afternoon by an undercover constable.

The constable, who was working in Christchurch between February and September under the alias of Harry Harvey, was repeating what Robert Stanley Tuck, who has been convicted of three charges of selling cannabis to the constable, had said to him on one occasion. Tuck was appearing for the taking of evidence on oath from the constable before he was sentenced on the three charges of selling cannabis as well as five other charges. He was remanded on bail until Friday for sentence by Mr H. J. Evans, S.M. The Magistrate had agreed to hear the evidence on oath from the constable, who was brought back from Australia for his testimony, when an apparent conflict occurred between the police summary of facts and statements made by counsel (Mrs J. Anderson). According to her instructions from the defendant, he was in no way a dealer in cannabis or narcotics; he had at no stage offered to sell the narcotic and he had made no profit from the sales. The constable said that on one of the occasions he had bought cannabis from Tuck, the defendant had talked of being able to “get untold sticks” of cannabis. “There must be SIM worth of sticks in cold storage between Christchurch and Auckland as the heroin that Wayne Beri is locked up for was to be used to lace these sticks,” the defendant had said to ’him, the constable said. "Tuck then asked me if I could come up with $40,000, •as he had a scheme to bring

in a quantity of heroin into the country,” the constable said. “He said that he intended to go to Singapore and buy a Honda 750 c.c. motor-cycle and take it overland to Hong Kong, where he would buy the heroin and conceal it in the frame tubes of the motorcycle,” he said. “He would then ride it around with the heroin still inside until he thought it was ‘cool.’ “He said that he thought there would be a S4M profit in this,” the constable said. The Magistrate suppressed any evidence that might lead to the identification of the constable, but he refused a request by the prosecutor (Inspector Peter Coster) for the suppression of the evidence relating to the method Tuck was planning to use to bring heroin into New Zealand. The constable said that he had met Tuck after an introduction from a contact who was under the impression that he was involved with narcotics and receiving and was in the market for buying “done.” or cannabis. “I gave $2O to my contact before we arrived at an address in Worcester Street and when I asked Tuck what he had, he produced five metal foil packages out of a cigarette packet,” he said. “He gave me one, which I opened. It appeared to be hashish, and he told me they were $l5 each. I gave him $lO and told my contact to give him the $2O I had already given him.

“When my contact kept $5 of this, Tuck objected saying that would mean he would only make $1 a deal,” he said. “1 asked what else he had available, and he said he had some Sumatran sticks, which are about eight inches long and as thick as a broom handle. The defendant told me I could get in touch with him at the Bush Inn, where he worked as a bouncer.”

The constable told the Court of the two other occasions he had bought cannabis from the defendant. On the first of these occasions, he had gone to what he was told was the defendant’s home in Springfield Road and, while he was there, one person had come in and asked the defendant, in the constable’s hearing, if if he had any dope. The telephone had rung several times also, and the' defendant had told him that these calls were “from people wanting dope.” On the third occasion, the defendant had told him that he was interested in opening up the market for narcotics in Dunedin and Invercargill. “He said he was $6OOO in

debt and had turned to deal ing to get himself out of the hole,” the constable told the Court. “He talked about fast motor-cycles and cars to be used to deliver the drugs south, and Tuck said that he had the ability to build a Capri car capable of 120 miles an hour to deliver narcotics. I told him that I had heard that people were paying as much as $22 for a stick further south than Christchurch,” the constable said. Asked by Mrs Anderson how he had managed to buy narcotics from so many people, the constable replied: “There’s so much of it around, it’s everywhere you go.” In reply to a question by Mrs Anderson as to the possibility of the constable demanding cannabis from; Tuck, the constable said that he had not requested to buy cannabis in the first in-; stance. It was only when he knew that Tuck was dealing in narcotics that he had asked to buy the cannabis. In defence, Tuck said that he had been contacted on each occasion by the constable and had been asked to buy drugs for him, and the talk of the overseas trip was only in very general terms. Reserving his decision until Friday, the Magistrate said that the matters brought out by the constable on oath made the case far, more serious than he had, thought after hearing the police summary.