WEST END DOPE TRAFFIC

Waikato Times, Volume 97, Issue 15274, 26 June 1923, Page 2

WEST END DOPE TRAFFIC

SINISTER GREEK’S CAFE. A NOTORIOUS RENDEZVOUS. What the police regard as the worst hot-bed of dope traffickers in the West End has been stamped out as the result of a case in London in April, when Alex, lassonides (50), a Greek, and Jack Rosa (38), a Maltese, partners in the Montmartre Cafe, Church Street. Soho, were sentenced to six months’ hard labour each for being in unauthorised possession of cocaine. lassonides was recommended for deportation. His wife and nephew have already been deported following similar prosecutions. Ever since the war the Montmartre Cafe has been a notorious centre of London's ' underworld. Constantly subjected to police supervision, it has been the scene of over a dozen arrests in connection with the drug traffic. For the last year lassonides, one of the most sinister figures in the Continental dope ring, has been in charge of the cafe, using Rosa, the Maltese, as his assistant. ; ' Formerly a steward on a liner route between London and' Egypt, lassonides got in touch with cocaine agents in Cairo and elsewhere by this means. Having established connection . with foreign agents with ample supplies or tile drug, he acquired the tenancy of the Soho cafe to cloak his activities in the West End. • Though called a cafe, in the dingy iittie business in Church Street, no meals were served during lassonides tenancy. It was used solely as a resort for. the sale 0 f cocaine to women, and men customers were not allowed in the “restaurant.” So strict was the “women only rule that the police had to employ a woman patrol oflicer, Miss Fox, to secure clefinite evidence of the sale of cocaine. Greek’s Huge Profits. Huge profits were made by the Greek 'during his year’s tenancy of the cafe. A five shilling packet was his customary sale. Such a packet contained one grain of cocaine—about enough, with a dilution of boracic acid, to cover a threepenny piece. On the premises were found one ounce of the drug, costing 225. On this quantity lassonides would realise £SO0 —for from one ounce he made, with the added boracic powder, 2000 5s packets. The packets were, of brown paper, about twice the length of a postage stamp and half its width. They were hidden with extraordinary care. Under the linoleum, in violin cases, and in a box labelled resin, for the violin, quantities of the drug were found. An unceasing vigil was maintained by lassonides and his satellites Irom upper windows on ttie streets below t 0 guard against chance intruders. If an unknown customer penetrated the door she was told that “the business was jusL changing hands, and no food was available.” When, a l’ew months ago, lassonides’ wife ami nephew were deported, the Greek let the woman bear the brunt of the charge, declaring that he was merely a servant at the establishment. His wife, also a Greek, is now in Paris, lassonides recently transferred £4OO from his bank in this country to wife in Paris. The Secret Room. The cocaine never passed hands in the front part of lassonides’ shop. Women clients were ushered out into a 'secret room in the basement, where the "snow” was taken under the proprietor’s supervision. ■ lassonides was described by a neighbour as a man of quiet reserved, suspicious temperament, but this “quiet, reserved man” made an amazing outburst as he was being led away to the cells after his conviction. "The rays of the mighty sun shall wither up the conspirators who have hatched this plot to bring about my ruin,” he declared, gesticulating expressively.