ECSTASY PRODUCTION SOARING, POLICE SAY AFTER 4 SENTENCED

After a Richmond judge handed down record sentences to four ecstasy
producers this week, police said the volume of the drug being made at
clandestine labs is skyrocketing.

The total number of B.C.-made ecstasy pills seized by U.S. border
officials grew from just 40,000 in 2003 to 2.2 million in the first
nine months of 2007, RCMP Insp. Brian Cantera said Tuesday.

"What we are seeing is a large number of unregulated chemicals and
precursors from all other parts of the world, more than we have ever
seen in the past."

Investigators were pleased a Richmond judge sentenced four members of
an organized crime group Monday to jail terms ranging from four to
eight years for producing ecstasy in one of the biggest synthetic drug
labs ever uncovered in Canada, RCMP Cpl. Norm Massie said.

Two labs were uncovered in a massive probe by the Waterfront Joint
Forces Operation, which began in September 2005 when a Transport
Canada dangerous goods inspector became curious about a shipment of
600 kilograms of sodium borohydride -- one of the ecstasy precursor
chemicals -- at Deltaport.

The subsequent busts yielded 200 kilograms of liquid ecstasy from a
home at 6651 No. 5 Rd. and "significant" quantities of chemicals from
a residence at 5111 Steveston Hwy.

Patrick Dan Chang, 34, found to have imported the chemicals from
China, was convicted on two counts of production of a controlled
substance, as well as conspiracy to commit an indictable offence. He
got eight years, with almost five years credit for time served.

Tik Sheun Dison Ngai, 32, received five years behind bars, while
51-year-old Kai Ming Fung and Ka Wah Chan, 47, received four-year sentences.

Massie said a huge quantity of ecstasy was prevented from hitting the
streets.

"Ecstasy is a drug that is really designed to target young people," he
said. "The larger the quantity, the greater the harm to the community."

A fifth accused, realtor Albert Wai Ming Luk, was acquitted in
January.

"The dismantling of the two drug labs represented one of the largest
organized crime disruptions of synthetic labs in Canadian history,"
Massie said. The volume of precursor chemicals at the Richmond sites
could have yielded 15 million pills.

Cantera said organized crime groups are moving into the production of
synthetic drugs because of the ease with which they can import the
precursors, which remain legal in Canada but are banned in the U.S.
There are now brokers working in both Canada and other countries to
help secure the chemicals.

"The whole trend here right now [is] these chemical drugs," he said.
"Clearly it is an area that can be expanded in Canada because of the
precursor laws. It is another market where organized crime can expand."

Cantera said police have seen a "steady increase in the numbers of
labs, dump sites, and storage facilities" used for the toxic
precursors, some of which are leaching into the environment because of
unsafe storage or dumping. "Vancouver is being utilized as a
distribution point worldwide for these drugs."