CANNABIS HAUL SPARKS HUGE CROSS-BORDER INVESTIGATION

GARDAI have launched a full scale cross-border investigation following
the arrest of a man from Armagh and the seizure of cannabis resin
worth approximately IEP850,000 near Balbriggan, Co Dublin early
yesterday morning.

The man was arrested after he drove the wrong way along part of the
Balbriggan by-pass and through the town at speeds close to 100mph.

Garda sources suspect the drugs were imported by one of the North's
major drug dealers who has connections with loyalist paramilitaries.
He is believed to be operating out of Portadown at the moment and the
drugs would have been distributed there and in Belfast.

Gardai have established that the drugs were picked up at Dublin port
early yesterday morning and the car was checked by gardai from Store
Street sometime later, possibly because it has a Northern
registration.

CHECKPOINT

However it was not searched and continued along the main
Dublin-Belfast road. When it met a Garda checkpoint at the start of
the Balbriggan by-pass, the car took off at high speed and went the
wrong way up a slip road leading onto the north bound carriageway of
the motorway.

The vehicle, a green Daewoo Nexia, drove at high speed through
Balbriggan. However there was very little traffic and the car
continued on towards Gormanstown.

It was pursued by gardai and crashed a short distance north of the
village. The driver took to nearby fields, chased by gardai.

The driver, a 36-year-old man from Loughgaul, Co Armagh, was arrested
and was last night in custody in Balbriggan garda station under the
Drug Trafficking Act where he was being questioned by members of the
Garda National Drugs Unit.

When gardai searched the car they found 85 kilos of cannabis resin in
the boot. The haul was examined by members of the garda forensic team
yesterday afternoon.

A garda source said the seizure would be a significant loss for those
involved in the drug trade in the North.

Garda Chief Superintendent Michael Finnegan, said this was very
significant and hot on the heels of the cannabis resin find worth
IEP200,000 in Slane on Tuesday evening. However gardai are not linking
the two incidents.

TOUGHER SENTENCES

Meanwhile last night Labour Party Senator Joe Costello demanded
tougher sentences for heroin gangs from abroad.

Sen Costello said the “relatively light sentences” being imposed by
Irish courts on foreign drug couriers convicted of importing huge
amounts of heroin was undermining the fight against drugs.

He referred in particular to a six-year sentence handed down this week
to an English man convicted of importing IEP5m worth of heroin.

The man was part of a network which smuggled in vast amounts of drugs
from Manchester to Dublin.

“This gang is directly responsible for the destruction of individuals
and communities across our city and it beggars belief that a major
player in this evil trade received only six years in a Dublin court,”
added Sen Costello.

The sentencing policy was sending out a message to British based drugs
gangs that Ireland was a “soft touch” he maintained.