Pubdate: Mon, 09 Oct 2000
Source: Manawatu Evening Standard (New Zealand)
Address: PO Box 3, Palmerston North, Manawatu, New Zealand
Fax: +64 6 350 9836

DRUG DEALER TO LOSE CITY HOME IN FORCED SALE

The Palmerston North home in which convicted drug dealer Malcolm Stanley Smith sold the chemicals to make heroin, is to be forfeited to the Crown.

Smith, 54, was sentenced to 12 years' jail in the High Court at Palmerston North in March, after he was found guilty on all but one of 24 charges of possessing and supplying morphine sulphate and acetyl chloride, the key ingredients used to make heroin.

The offences covered a nine-year period between January, 1990, and August, 1999.

In the Wellington High Court last week, Justice Ellis ordered that Smith's home at 173 Featherston Street, where addicts reportedly "lined up like a sale at the Warehouse", be forfeited to the Crown as "tainted property" under the Proceeds of Crime Act.

He also ordered that the estimated $777,000 worth of shares, property, jewelry, wine and other assets Smith amassed from selling the drugs be sold.

This enables the Crown to apply for a pecuniary penalty order to seize the profits from his illegal activities.

Smith, a former pharmacist, was arrested after an almost year-long undercover operation, in which a police informant recorded the drug deals he made with a hidden video camera.

Representing the Crown in the High Court were Ben Vanderkolk and Saul Holt, with Auckland-based barrister Murray Gibson appearing for Smith.
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