MARIJUANA TRADE 'NOT A VICTIMLESS CRIME'

The marijuana-related shooting of five people in an apartment above
the Carnegie Deli exposes the myth that the pot trade isn't associated
with violence, law enforcement officials said Friday.

As First Deputy Commissioner Joseph Dunne put it, "We've been saying
this for eight years-there are guns and violence in the marijuana
trade." The sale and use of marijuana, said Police Commissioner
Bernard Kerik, "is not a victimless crime. Anyone who believes it is
should have been in that apartment ... and seen those victims on the
floor, bound and gagged. These people were executed over marijuana."
Bridget Brennan, the city's special narcotics prosecutor, agrees.

"Marijuana is a highly profitable drug," she said, "Money is the
source of most narcotics disputes. These guys can't settle their
disputes in court." Brennan adds that although marijuana tends to be
viewed "as something benign," the groups moving marijuana are some of
the same that are moving cocaine and heroin. "We are seeing some of
the traffickers up from South America mixing loads," she said.