HAMBURG - The crusade of the police against the "party drug" ecstasy
continues: Only two days after the raid on the techno club "Tunnel"
two large-scale dealers were arrested and more than 100,000 of the
dangerous pills confiscated. This marks the largest amount seized ever
in the city of Hamburg. The pills have a black-market value of over
two million German marks [US$1 million].

A tip had brought the drug squad on the trail of the two Hamburg men
(aged 54 and 49). On monday, the 54-year-old man was arrested in a
parking lot near Alster Lake. During a search of his car police found
85,000 pills that he had just picked up from his accomplice in
Wilhelmsburg [south part of the city]. The 49-year-old man was
arrested a few hours later. Another 16,500 pills were later found
hidden in his yard. Investigators believe that the drugs were brought
to Germany from Holland by the two suspects.

The leader of the Hamburg drugs squad, Thomas Menzel, urgently warned
about the dangers of ecstasy. He said that while the drug has a very
much benign reputation among users, it is the cause of irreversible
damage to the brain. Menzel announced further action against the
ecstasy scene.

(cont'd page 15)

HAMBURG'S LARGEST ECTASY BUST: DRUG STASH FOUND IN YARD

Thousands of white pills in plastic bags are lying on the desk at the
Hamburg drug squad: 101,500 in all. A vast pile. Or about equivalent
to the amount consumed in the city of Hamburg in a single weekend, as
well as the largest amount of the dangerous "party drug" ever seized
here. Investigators discovered 85,000 pills in a BMW's trunk and the
rest buried in a safe buried in a back yard.

The ecstasy dealers, two Hamburg residents, smuggled the pills here
from the Netherlands, with the intent of selling them here in the
coming week, but they were already being tailed by the police. The men
had prior police records for crimes such as burglary and
safe-cracking.

The trap the police had set closed on Monday, when Peter R. (54) was
arrested in a parking lot outside the "Cliff" club on Alster Lake.
While searching his car, the police turned up two sports bags in the
trunk that contained the 85,000 pills. He was observed while taking
delivery of the drugs earlier from his accomplice, who was also
arrested later and lead the police to a yard in Wilhelmsburg where, he
admitted, he had stashed more drugs.

The police were quite surprised to find another 15,000 ecstasy tablets
under the man's bed, as well as another 1,500 in a safe that was
buried in the yard.

The pills look as benign as headache medicine, but they are in fact
highly dangerous drugs. The pills just seized are highly popular in
the scene - they bear the "Mitsubishi" logo and are, according police
drug expert Horst Renz, "of very high quality". This means that they
contain a large amount of the euphorizing chemical MDMA, which causes
serious damage to health.

The Ecstasy dealer scene is firmly under the control of Germans, says
Renz. Foreigners are rarely found to be active in the party drug
business. The larger players are hard to make out. Cord W. and Peter
R. have been accusing each other to mastermind the operation.

DRUG SQUAD NOW HUNTING LARGE-SCALE DEALERS OF PILLS AND CRACK

The Abendblatt interviewed Thomas Menzel, 43, director of the police
department's drug squad, about the drug scene in the city.

ABENDBLATT: Fist the raid on the "Tunnel" club, now the spectacular
bust of two large-scale dealers... Are you planning to go down in
history as the big clean-up man on the matter of Ecstasy?

MENZEL: The fight against Ecstasy is on of our focal points.
Unfortunately, the danger stemming from this drug is still being
underestimated by both the users and the general public. The
availability, here in Hamburg as well as in other major city, is
steadily increasing. The pills cropped up mainly in the Techno scene
in the beginning, where as now they are very available outside of this
scene any time of the day.

ABENDBLATT: What is it that makes Ecstasy so dangerous?

MENZEL: Consuming Ecstasy can lead to irreversible damage to the
brain. This has been proved in scientific trials. In addition to that,
we still know very little about the long-term damage. As a party
drug, Ecstasy has only been on the market for about ten years. It is a
hard drug and it's psychologically addicting like cocaine. The pills
initially have a stimulating effect along with feeling of joy, but
later the effect is followed by severe depression.

ABENDBLATT: Who is swallowing the dangerous pills?

MENZEL: Most of the consumers are between 13 and 25 years of age.
The Ecstasy scene is complete separate from the open drug scene
[Heroin and Cocaine scene, ed.]. The pills are consumed over the
weekend at parties and in clubs. Most of the consumers are not living
a life of crime and poverty like heroin addicts, but are usually
enrolled in school or working.

ABENDBLATT: What are your planning next? Are you planning any more
raids on clubs in the city?

MENZEL: If we have evidence of drug dealing taking place inside a
club, we will act. The targets of the repressive action are not the
users of the drug. We want to bring light to the dealer structure and
break into it's upper echelons.

ABENDBLATT: There is another new phenomenon in the drug scene: crack,
smokeable cocaine. It's been exploding. What is the police doing about
it?

MENZEL: The crack scene is not it's own scene, it belongs to the
open drug scene. At this time we have three full-time officers in the
squad that are minding the crack problem full-time. But, there is some
imminent re-structuring taking place inside the police organization
and new problems like crack and ecstasy will be sure to receive
consideration.

ABENDBLATT: Hasn't the police been a little bit hesitant to address
the crack problem? Street workers have been warning about it for years...

MENZEL: We have also been following this phenomenon for a long
time, but crack only became really visible in the scene last year.
Since then we have been keeping abreast of the develop-ment of this
new trend.

ABENDBLATT: In light of all these new dangerous trends, aren't you
asking yourself the question of whether it's reasonable to still
devote resources to combat "soft" drugs like hashish and marihuana?

MENZEL: No. There are also objectives of the drug squad. The trade
in "soft" drugs cannot be underestimated, and is highly organized in
Hamburg. That's why we combat it -- also, to make access to drugs more
difficult.

(Interview by: Kristina Johrde, Abendblatt staff writer.)