’Businessmen in hard-drug deals’

Press, 17 February 1978, Page 17

’Businessmen in hard-drug deals’

PA Wellington Some people involved in hard-drug dealings were well-respected businessmen. the chairman of the Government caucus committee on drugs (Mr J. R. Harrison) said. He told a press conference that it had become clear to members of the committee that New? Zealand was now part of the international drug scene, and that drug dealing was being carried out on a “highly sophisticated and big-business basis. “We know that at least some of the people involved in drug dealing are, for all intents and purposes, well-respected citizens conducting legitimate business as well as the big business of drug dealing, ’ he said.

Mr Harrison said it appeared that the businesses run by this type of drug dealer were a cover for

the lucrative profits of drugs. A cover business tended to be one that dealt with large amounts of cash. The police had told the committee that there were close links between drugs and crime, he said. There was evidence of intimidation and even murder to protect drug dealers from identification. Mr Harrison said a subcommittee set up to study surveillance of the drug problem had found that the police and the Custo ns Department were well organised. The committee might recommend that they be supplied with more equipment. Mr Harrison said he had been surprised by the extent of the hard-drug problem.

“Some of us previously thought in terms of hundreds of hard-drug users. But I think we can say there are thousands,” he said.