DRUG PARAPHERNALIA SEIZED FROM CITY STORES

Police Raid Also Nets Marijuana

So much for Super Bong Tuesday.

Eager customers snapping up merchandise at a 10 per cent discount
weren't the ones responsible for clearing the shelves at Bongs and
Such on Tuesday -- the police were.

Investigators raided the Macleod Trail store and three others as part
of a four-month undercover investigation targeting businesses
allegedly selling drug paraphernalia.

Although the 3,000 pipes, bongs and other goods seized from Bongs and
Such, Boodlum, Hop In Hop Out and Canadian Convenience have legal
uses, police said they were being knowingly sold for use with drugs.

"We have a lot of issues downtown, a lot of drug issues downtown.
These stores are right in the middle of that and they're providing the
tools to allow people to use crack cocaine," said Staff Sgt. Monty
Sparrow of the drug unit.

Police haven't laid any charges, but Sparrow stressed the
investigation is continuing.

Investigators didn't identify any of the businesses they raided, but
said an 8th Avenue S.W. store had 3.6 kilograms of marijuana, 500
marijuana joints, 135 grams of hashish and 45 grams of marijuana oil,
and was selling the drugs to customers. Independent investigation
revealed the store was Boodlum.

"I attended the address at 8th Avenue and walked in and it was
unmistakable that there was marijuana in the business," Sparrow said.

Police seized all but about 100 of the pipes from Bongs and Such and
Boodlum. Both stores were closed Wednesday.

Amid the elaborately decorated glass, ceramic and plastic bongs
displayed by police -- some priced as high as $150 -- were otherwise
innocuous-looking glass tubes and bags of steel wool. The tubes were
manufactured to hold decorative flowers, but police allege Hop In Hop
Out and Canadian Convenience were selling them to crack addicts.

Addicts use steel wool as an improvised filter at the end of their
crack pipes. Sparrow showed a bag of steel wool pads that had been
removed from their original packaging, broken into small pieces and
sold in small baggies.

"Is there really any other purpose to having that in your store?"
Sparrow said.

The two 7th Avenue S.W. convenience store owners say customers are
buying steel wool for legitimate reasons.

"They're for cleaning -- it isn't illegal," Hop In Hop Out co-owner
Rizwan Haider said. "If people use it for (drugs), we don't know."