'WE'VE CHOPPED THE HEAD OFF THE SNAKE'

Raids Here and Abroad Net $168 Million in Drugs, 100 Arrests. 5.5
Tonnes of Drugs. $6 Million in Real Estate. $2.1 Million in Cash.
$300,000 Worth of Vehicles. 17 Prohibited Weapons

Yong Long Ye was the mastermind of a drug syndicate that was as
complex as it was astonishingly profitable, according to police.

Ye, who lived on Vancouver's Deering Island, just a stone's throw
from the sprawling homes and riding stables in the tony Southlands
area, received courier packages containing up to $250,000 two to
three times a week, police said.

They said he received more than $4 million over a three-month period
- -- the profits from an operation that employed dozens of people.

Those were among the details released Wednesday when police announced
the dismantling of what Sgt. Bill Whalen called the largest syndicate
his unit has ever cracked.

"Ye heads a very big organization," said Whalen, who is with the
Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit that led the investigation.

"We've chopped the head off the snake," said Vancouver police Insp.
Dean Robinson.

Seventeen Lower Mainland men -- including Ye -- have been arrested
and are facing a variety of drugs and weapons charges. More than 100
people around the world will be arrested and charged, said police.

They said the investigation led to the seizure of drugs with a
wholesale value of $168 million.

According to police, the group imported thousands of kilograms of
cocaine from the United States and supplied local methamphetamine and
ecstasy labs with precursor chemicals. It then used specially built
boxes and luggage with hidden compartments to distribute the drugs
throughout the Pacific Rim.

Police trying to crack the case had to deal with gang members who
spoke Cantonese, Mandarin, Vietnamese, Punjabi and Hindi as well as
English and used elaborate codes to avoid detection.

The criminal empire stretched across the United States, Canada, Asia
and Australia and laundered profits through a complex system of bank
accounts in Canada and Asia, police said. They said Ye, 40, owned
houses and condos in the Vancouver area worth $6 million, which they
intend to seize under proceeds of crime laws.

Ye's world began to unravel in October 2006 when U.S. drug
enforcement officials learned that an organized crime group was
importing large quantities of cocaine from Los Angeles into Canada.

The cocaine, packed in false-bottom boxes loaded into shipping
containers, usually arrived by truck in Toronto, where a distribution
network was set up.

That information was passed to B.C.'s Integrated Gang Task Force,
which began to tug at the threads of Ye's empire.

The Vancouver-based smuggling operation had an impressive command and
control system, said Insp. Pat Fogarty of the Combined Forces Special
Enforcement Unit. Fogarty commanded the investigation by the unit,
which is made up of officers seconded from the RCMP and municipal
police forces.

The 14-month investigation, named Operation Paragon, took
investigators from the "violence of the streets right up to the
boardroom of the drug trade," he said.

Police said couriers carried large amounts of cash -- which police
said was proceeds of crime -- from Toronto to Ye in Vancouver via
commercial aircraft, with the usual shipment being $250,000.

"In a three-month period we estimate that between $4 million to $6
million in cash was transported," Fogarty said.

Police also uncovered a network transporting drug precursors into the
Lower Mainland, where they were used in the manufacture of ecstasy
and methamphetamines in clandestine laboratories.

Once the drugs were manufactured in Canada, they were distributed by
couriers posing as tourists, who would take ecstasy and
methamphetamines from Vancouver to Australia, Taiwan, New Zealand and
Japan. The gang was also importing heroin into Canada from India and Pakistan.

Police displayed examples of suitcases used by the gang. They had
been altered to allow drugs to be stowed between the outer case and
inner liner.

Small boxes had also been built in a similar way. The boxes were
filled with virtually worthless goods taken from thrift stores and
sent overseas.

Police also seized 17 handguns and prohibited weapons, $2.1 million
in cash, 5.5 tonnes of drugs, and $300,000 worth of vehicles.

Sgt. Shinder Kirk of the B.C. Integrated Gang Task Force said the
gang was responsible for bringing drugs and weapons into the Lower
Mainland and was "one of the root causes of crime and violence" in
local communities.

Special Agent Matt Ryan of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency was
delighted with the results of the Canadian investigation.

"We couldn't have asked for better cooperation or a better result," Ryan said.

Standing behind stacks of drugs, weapons and cash that represented
just a fraction of what police have recently seized, members of the
various police agencies involved in the investigation attempted to
put it into perspective.

"Gangsters and drug traffickers don't respect borders; neither do the
police," said the Vancouver police's Dean Robinson. "We know this
will have a large impact on the drug trade in the Lower Mainland."

Marianne Ryan, chief officer of the Combined Forces Special
Enforcement Unit, said the investigation was the largest and most
complex of any drug investigation mounted in B.C.

She said the public should be aware that police forces are working
quietly and effectively against organized crime "and criminals should
take note also."

As for why the operation was based in Vancouver, Whalen said a busy
seaport, airport and a land border with the U.S. make it logistically
an ideal place to run a drug-smuggling operation.

The Canadian investigators worked with the U.S. Drug Enforcement
Agency to identify gang members in California and with the Australian
federal police to seize the Canadian-made methamphetamine and ecstasy there.