DRUG CHARGES STAYED IN HIGH-PROFILE CASE

THE son of a man implicated in an alleged cross-border ephedrine
smuggling ring was one of seven people who had charges against them
stayed in court yesterday.

[Name redacted], was among dozens of people swept up two years ago in
an RCMP investigation into the bulk movement of ephedrine, which can
be used to make the highly addictive street drug methamphetamine,
across Canada and into the United States.

[Name redacted], 21, was originally charged with three counts of
conspiracy to produce methamphetamine, conspiracy to export ephedrine
and export of ephedrine. He's the son of [Name redacted], who's
portrayed by police as the ringleader in the alleged smuggling
scheme. He died last year.

In an earlier interview, [Name redacted], said he had done nothing wrong.

"Police kept asking me to tell on my father," he said. "I couldn't
tell them anything because I didn't know."

The Crown also stayed a similar charge against [Name redacted]. [Name
redacted], 36, is one of three Winnipeg men charged in June with
eight counts each of first-degree murder in connection to a so-called
internal cleansing of the Bandidos outlaw motorcycle gang in Ontario.
[Name redacted], who is in custody in Ontario, had been charged with
conspiracy to produce methamphetamine.

Charges were also stayed against[Name redacted], [Name redacted],
[Name redacted], [Name redacted], and [Name redacted],

Federal Crown attorney Tony Kavanaugh offered no explanation why the
Crown has stayed the charges.

Charges against others arrested in the case -- RCMP called it
Operation Diversion -- remain before the courts in Winnipeg, Buffalo,
N.Y., and Sacramento, Calif.

Police alleged huge shipments of ephedrine imported legally into
Canada made their way onto the black market through a company in
Thunder Bay, Ont. Some of the ephedrine was shipped to B.C. and some
was smuggled in horse trailers across the U.S. border into Buffalo,
where it was then couriered to California to be made into the methamphetamine.