CRACKDOWN ON STREET DEALERS

West-End Sweep

Toronto police swept through five of the city's roughest intersections
this month, rounding up nearly 100 drug dealers and addicts who had
made the west downtown neighbourhoods almost unlivable for residents.

Project ICE led to the arrest of 96 people and 238 drug-related
charges, and signalled a new emphasis on cracking down on street-level
drug dealers by the Toronto force, Staff Inspector Don Campbell, head
of the Toronto police drug squad, said yesterday.

"We're doing these neighbourhoods one at a time, focusing on the
street-level dealing, because that's what affects people's lives on a
daily basis," said Staff Insp. Campbell. "We're sending our people
into the hot spots and clearing them out."

The sweep announced yesterday was aimed at west downtown intersections
that had become notorious havens for dealers and addicts: Bloor and
Ossington, Bloor and Lansdowne, Queen and Lansdowne, Queen and
Bathurst and King and Dufferin.

Those areas were picked because of a flood of calls from local
residents and shop owners complaining about a drug problem that
appeared out of control. "We were getting calls [from local shop
owners] that the drug dealers are outnumbering the customers three to
one at the door, and the customers are afraid to come into the
stores," Detective Sergeant Ed Roseto said. "We were having kids
accosted on their way to school to purchase drugs from these dealers."

Project ICE, which police said stands for Infiltrate Crack
Entrepreneurs, is the second major street-drug operation this month. A
series of raids two weeks ago, code-named Project Take the Money and
Run, rounded up dozens of drug dealers plying their trade on one of
the busiest sections of downtown Yonge Street, including some caught
selling crack cocaine in the same building as a provincial court, just
around the corner from police headquarters.

Staff Insp. Campbell said the west-end intersections are only the
latest targets in the crackdown on the city's drug dealers. "I can say
with complete confidence there will be more," he said yesterday.

The operation was greeted with a collective sigh of relief by area
residents and business owners, who said they have had to put up with
almost intolerable conditions over the past few months as dealers and
addicts made the area, just west of downtown, their preferred haunt.

Donna Cowan, a marketing executive with the National Film Board and
head of the neighbourhood citizen's group, said she was often afraid
to drive into her garage because the laneway beside her home was often
used by prostitutes and dealers. "Every time I come home, I drive down
my laneway and I brace: I don't know what I'm going to be confronted
by," she said. "I've encountered groups of drug dealers, users, people
in the sex trade on a pretty regular basis.

"I've had to circle around, wait for them to go away so I can get into
my garage."

She said the proliferation of the drug trade was making her
neighbourhood almost unlivable: "The streets are loaded with these
drug dealers and addicts ... it's demoralizing."

The crackdown involved 26 officers, as well as a squad of undercover
detectives, who spent five weeks buying drugs and arresting dealers at
the targeted intersections. Although officers seized only a relatively
small quantity of drugs, including crack cocaine, marijuana, hashish,
ecstasy and LSD, Det.-Sgt. Roseto said it had the effect of clearing
out almost all of the dealers who had previously been openly buying
and selling on the street corners.

Det.-Sgt. Roseto said nearly half of those arrested in the sweep were
either on probation or out on bail from other drug charges, and all
had multiple convictions on their records. "Cumulatively, all of the
people arrested had 1,600 convictions on their criminal records," he
said. "Only a third of the people that we arrested actually lived in
[the neighbourhoods affected.]"

He said police will follow up on the sweep by putting more uniformed
officers on patrol throughout the areas swept clear of the drug trade
and by monitoring those arrested over the past five weeks to ensure
they abide by their bail conditions. "We will remain in the area and
keep working on it." .

However, Ms. Cowan said that as welcome as the police action was, it
will probably only have a temporary effect. "After an initiative like
this, the streets and the bad bars are clean and we breathe a sigh of
relief," she said. "[But] as the police dollars and resources get
called elsewhere, they trickle back."

"It's a big battle, it's an uphill battle ... we're dealing with the
end problem; we need to deal with the beginning of the problem."

BACK STORY:

Toronto police routinely assign code names to major investigations,
but police spokesmen say there is often little rhyme or reason to why
one code name is picked over another.

"Usually it's just the guys around the [detective] squad room bouncing
ideas around," said Staff Inspector Don Campbell, head of the force's
drug squad. A selection of recent code names and their explanations:
Project ICE - an acronym for "Infiltrate Crack Entrepreneurs."

Project Take The Money And Run - an undercover sweep of drug dealers
on downtown Yonge Street. So named because officers seized suspected
dealers' collections of cash. Project Cheddar - anti-gang operation,
named because of the street name of a gang leader, "Cheesie," and the
slang for money: "cheese."