TRAFFIC IN DRUGS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21698, 13 January 1934, Page 8

TRAFFIC IN DRUGS

BAID IN MELBOURNE

ALLEGED CLEARING HOUSE COCAINE AND OPIUM £I'ROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT] MELBOURNE. Jan. i Sensational disclosures followed a p> ice raid a few days ago on a house in a Chinese quarter of Melbourne. Ihe police alleged that they had discovered a clearing house for contraband drugs. They claim that their raid will seriously interfere with drug traffickers in the Southern State. When the police entered the house thej found that all the windows were heavily barred. Inside they discovered dozens of ingenious hiding places behind false panels, in drawers, in the walls and in the architraves of the doors. One hiding place, which contained a quantity of a drug, was the cloth bottom of a pin container on a dressing table. The police seized a large quantity of cocaine which they found,y behind the face of a. clock and in various hiding places in the bedrooms. They also found tins; of opium, containers and pipes. Money, running into fyundreds of pounds in notes and silver, was found in various parts of the house, also a number of small Chinese envelopes which, the police alleged, were used in the distribution of drugs.

Alsatian Dog as Guard The first warning of the existence of the alleged clearing house for drugs was given when a constable was called to a disturbance in the house. He found a Chinese and a white woman inside and questioned them. It is stated that a Chinese took a packet from behind the clock and threw it between the bats of a window into the yard below. There a large Alsatian dog stood guard over it, sniffing at the package. The ferocity of this particular dog has been a byword in the locality for some months, but the constable noticed that when a young Chinese went to pick up the package the dog did not attempt to interfere. "When the woman was taken to the police station she alleged that she had been stripped and beaten in the house. She told the police that there was cocaine in the house worth at least £7OO. It had been refrom a ship which had arrived from the East the day before. Alleged "Dope" Ring

The collector of Customs at Melbourne/ Mr. S. Synan, said there was an organised "dope" ring with agents in every State. It controlled most ot the traffic in cocaine in Australia. The police and customs men knew most of the members of the ring but it was seldom that opportunity was given for a coup. The profits from the saje of drugs were so large that the men who handled the stuff could surround themselves with every convenience for its transport. "

Drugs never came to the same port on successive occasions, said Mr. Synan. One time they would be landed at Adelaide, another at Brisbane, another at Perth, and so on. The difficulty in detection lay in the fact that cocaine was very easy to handle. Small quantities were worth a large amount and th? profits were so great as to make the risk of detection worth while. Most of the world's supply of cocaine now came from Germany. Formerly Australian dealers had to rely on the East.