DEAL ALLOWS ALLEGED ECSTASY DEALER TO STAY IN CANADA

Husband Accepts Tough U.S. Justice To Protect Wife, Children

TORONTO - When Kay Wu was arrested in her Toronto home last year in a huge
drug sweep, U.S. authorities pegged her as a major player -- listing her
second in their lengthy indictment against 21 men and women accused of
running the largest ecstasy ring on the continent.

The only name listed above hers by a New York City court was that of her
husband, Ze Wai Wong, who is the alleged kingpin in a cross-border drug and
money-laundering ring of huge proportions.

Yesterday, in Ontario Superior Court, the U.S. government had a different
message for Ms. Wu: All is forgiven.

The withdrawal of the U.S. request for extradition against Ms. Wu, who was
born in China but obtained Canadian citizenship, comes in exchange for her
husband's agreement last December to turn himself over to U.S. officials.

The stakes for both were high.

Mr. Wong, 46, and Ms. Wu, 40, were arrested in Toronto on March 31, 2004,
during co-ordinated arrests in 16 U.S. cities as well as Ottawa and Montreal.

In all, 170 were arrested.

Later that day, officials in Washington, D.C., Toronto and Ottawa each
announced that they had smashed a network that used Ontario as a base to
flood the U.S. with the club drug, ecstasy.

Mr. Wong was named as the boss of the operation that included alleged
gangsters with colourful nicknames, like Sloppy, Big Boobs and The Principal.

After the arrests, however, negotiations began that led to yesterday's deal
that sees Mr. Wong facing harsher justice in the U.S. -- up to 40 years in
prison -- in return for Ms. Wu, and the couple's two children, being
allowed to stay in Canada.

The twist adds a hard-luck love story to a sordid crime chronicle.

"His continuing to fight his extradition would have put her and her case in
jeopardy," Randall Barrs, Ms. Wu's lawyer, said outside of court.

The New York indictment alleged that in 2002 Ms. Wu -- at the direction of
her husband -- passed approximately 800 ecstasy pills to an undercover
American officer operating in Toronto.

"They were painting her as the madame of international ecstasy trafficking.
That wasn't fair and not borne out by the evidence," said Mr. Barrs.

"It was largely a case of her being in the wrong place at the wrong time,
and her association with her husband put her in the worst possible light,"
he said.