Pubdate: Wed, 12 Jan 2000
Source: Sydney Morning Herald (Australia)
Contact:  http://www.smh.com.au/
Author: Greg Bearup

POLICE ON TARGET WITH $36M DRUG BUST

In police jargon it's "targeted policing" - picking the players most likely
and following their every move.

It is an expensive and time-consuming form of policing, but yesterday,
after three months of investigation, the Australian Federal Police carried
out Australia's largest ecstasy bust - a haul of 240,000 tablets and enough
powder to make another 180,000 tablets - plus nine kilograms of cocaine.

Its total market value was assessed at $36 million.

Ecstasy has become the big money earner in Sydney, and the Federal police
began their investigations three months ago, concentrating on a group which
included77-year-old colourful Gold Coast identity John Victor Sparrow.

"We became interested in them and started checking out what they were up
to, when we learnt that these ... figures from Queensland and NSW were in
contact with a company that had been importing agricultural machinery from
Europe for many years," a police source said.

"Basically these people had shown very little interest in agriculture
during their long careers."

Police allege that the group became friendly with people associated witha
small Queensland importing company, and that John Sparrow had organised for
a large shipment of ecstasy from Rotterdam, in the Netherlands, which set
sail on November 27. Around-the-clock surveillance was then placed on all
the alleged principals.

The consignment landed on January 4 and customs officers searched the
container which held a large shipment of machinery. Using new technology, a
scan which can detect minute traces of drugs, they took samples from each
crate and a positive reading was found in one containing 36 hydraulic rams.

The rams contained 240,000 ecstasy tablets, nine kilogramsof ecstasy powder
and nine kilograms of cocaine, which were removed and replaced with an
inert substance.

The shipment was then allowed to go on its way to Queensland. On Friday the
rams were driven to Sydney and taken to bits at an Enfield factory.

Last weekend and on Monday a series of meetings were held at the Sheraton
on Park Hotel in Elizabeth Street. At 2pm on Monday three bags were handed
over and police swooped, arresting six people in Sydney and Brisbane. They
also seized $270,000 in cash.

John Victor Sparrow, 77, Keith Albert Collingburn, 59, Edward Michael
Monahan, 54, and David Peter Cain, 39, appeared in court yesterday charged
with conspiring to import commercial quantities of cocaine and ecstasy.
Others face lesser charges.

The head of the operation, Federal Agent Ray Tinker, said he believed that
such a large seizure would inevitably disrupt the supply of drugs to the
"rave parties of Sydney and the Gold Coast".

He said that The Netherlands had become the main source of ecstasy into
Australia and that a Federal Agent would now be placed there permanently to
work with Dutch authorities to try tostem the tide.

There were strong indications to suggest that this had not been the first
shipment.
- ---
MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart