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 veggie
Registered: 07/26/04
Posts: 13,985
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 London largest drugs den busted 
#6782753 - 04/13/07 01:26 PM (6 years, 1 month ago) |
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London largest drugs den busted
April 13, 2007 - gulf-times.com
 LONDON: A Rastafarian temple that had been turned into London’s largest drug den was stormed by 100 armed police yesterday.
The men burst into the premises backed by another 150 officers. The biggest drug raid ever seen began at 3am with a series of explosions as 15 stun grenades were thrown to distract those inside.
Police burst into four terrace houses in Kennington which have been used as a place of worship by Rastafarians since Bob Marley visited in the Seventies. But a surveillance operation revealed that the properties in St Agnes Place had been turned into a massive drug dealing centre with 600 people a day visiting.
A police source said: “The place had been taken over by Yardies and turned into ‘Crack Central’. We knew firearms and major drug dealing was linked to the properties so we had to storm them with large numbers.” Members of the community are said to have alerted police.
A total of 23 people, including one woman, were arrested. The four Victorian townhouses - decorated in the green, yellow and red colours of Rastafarianism - are being searched for drugs and weapons.
Nearby resident Gary Wadsworth, 46, said: “We were woken at about 3am by some loud explosions. There were three bursts of 10 to 15 explosions and it sounded like gunfire. We later found out it was not gunshots.”
Lambeth borough commander, chief superintendent Martin Bridger, said: “A lot of officers were deployed. The searches are still taking place, nothing has been found as yet but the searches will take another day or two.
“Clearly the operation was not heavy-handed. No shots were fired but distraction devices were employed.
“It is believed that a high level of serious criminality has been operating from the premises which is adversely affecting the local communities.
“People close to the premises have come to us to say that it has been taken over by people dealing drugs. In the past few weeks we have arrested around 200 people coming away from the premises and they have had cannabis or crack cocaine on them. Some of the management committee from the community have come to me to say that it has not been used as a temple for a number of weeks.
“These other people have taken it over. It has a long history of being a Rastafarian temple but that is not what it is being used for.”
The police surveillance operation began last October and culminated in an intense 24-hour watch over the past eight weeks.
Officers had gathered evidence against a “core” of around a dozen people suspected of drug dealing. Bridger said some of the evidence included footage of a man waving a handgun outside the buildings.
He added that officers had seen “hordes” of people visiting the buildings during the surveillance operation. The temple will now be permanently closed down under the crack house closure scheme.
St Agnes Place, known locally as “Bob Marley Street”, became famous as London’s longest squatted street where residents resisted eviction orders for more than 30 years.
It was first squatted in 1969 and in the mid-Seventies Marley stayed among its large Rastafarian community. An attempt to evict them in 1977 was resisted although many buildings were demolished. The residents rebuilt them again.
In November 2005, Lambeth council got a High Court order to evict the 150 residents of 21 properties. The mass eviction was enforced by riot police after residents barricaded themselves in their six-bedroom Victorian townhouses, pledging to resist evictions and demolition.
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 Carbon_Black
Pause/Break
Registered: 05/15/06
Posts: 122
Loc: State, Country, etc. ';)
Last seen: 2 years, 1 month
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Re: London largest drugs den busted [Re: veggie]
#6784022 - 04/13/07 07:10 PM (6 years, 1 month ago) |
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>>Lambeth borough commander, chief superintendent Martin Bridger, said: “A lot of officers were deployed. The searches are still taking place, nothing has been found as yet but the searches will take another day or two.
--------------------
As Sure As The Sun Will Shine
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Quake3
Total Carbohydrate
Registered: 08/31/06
Posts: 924
Loc: Relatively New York
Last seen: 1 year, 11 months
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Re: London largest drugs den busted [Re: Carbon_Black]
#6790079 - 04/15/07 01:02 PM (6 years, 1 month ago) |
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Quote:
The police surveillance operation began last October and culminated in an intense 24-hour watch over the past eight weeks.
Officers had gathered evidence against a “core” of around a dozen people suspected of drug dealing. Bridger said some of the evidence included footage of a man waving a handgun outside the buildings.
He added that officers had seen “hordes” of people visiting the buildings during the surveillance operation. The temple will now be permanently closed down under the crack house closure scheme.
This is the type of evidence they have? Somebody waving a handgun OUTSIDE, and lots of people coming in and out of the building? Don't lots of people go in and out of Churchs and mosques also?
They found nothing, so how can they close the temple down?
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