CALL FOR INQUIRY INTO MISSING HEROIN

Paisley MP demands answers from customs over failed 'sting' after 54th death
by overdose

The anti-drugs campaigner MP Irene Adams is to demand a government inquiry
into whether a failed customs 'sting' is responsible for a massive increase
in drug-related deaths in the west of Scotland.

On Friday David McCracken, 26, died in a house in Ferguslie Park Avenue in
Adams' Paisley North constituency, the 54th person to die of a heroin
overdose. Police claim that a batch of super strength heroin may be
responsible for the spiralling increase in drug deaths. Two kilos of heroin
went missing in a bungled operation aimed at netting major drug dealers in
Scotland and England and is believed to have been circulating in Glasgow.

The total of drug deaths in Strathclyde so far this year is already greater
than the whole of last year and is on course to top 1995's record of 102.

Now Adams is demanding to know why customs officers were involved in
importing massive amounts of heroin from Pakistan to entrap dealers and
whether the missing heroin is responsible for the upsurge in deaths. She
said: "If 54 people had died of anything else it would be called an epidemic
and something would be done about it. Because it's drugs they're expendable.
I will be demanding of the minister responsible, Henry McLeish, a full
investigation into what's gone wrong and why these young people are dying."

In a case at Glasgow's High Court in April Shaukat Ali was sentenced to five
years for heroin trafficking. Police recovered Scotland's largest-ever
heroin haul, 18.5 kilos. The drugs were smuggled into the country by customs
agents on a scheduled flight from Pakistan and in the course of the 'sting',
which involved several alleged dealers in Scotland and the north of England,
two kilograms disappeared.

Donald Findlay, defence QC, said: "It would appear that the informant is
making a bit on the side."

Customs deny that they supply drugs to suspects to help gain convictions,
but a spokesman conceded that they do occasionally 'facilitate' shipments in
operations known as 'controlled deliveries'. When informants overseas
contact drugs liaison officers attached to British embassies about planned
shipments of drugs, free passage can be arranged in order to trap dealers
here.

An anonymous supergrass, dubbed Tariq by the authorities, was approached
last year to smuggle consignments from Pakistan, the world's most important
location for heroin trafficking. He contacted drugs officers and two
deliveries of heroin were then made to him in Pakistan, 20 kilos and 17.5
kilos. Then the drugs, along with Tariq and an undercover customs agent,
travelled from Islamabad through Manchester to Glasgow. One package went to
Leeds, the other batch was held in a warehouse in Glasgow watched by a
hidden video camera.

Shaukat Ali was then allowed to take two kilos of the batch as samples in
order to bait a trap by tempting drug barons. A middleman in Leeds was also
allowed to tale a similar amount. All of the heroin went missing. Customs
officials are unable to say what happened to the drugs. No one has been
arrested in connection with the disappearance.

However, another man involved in the 'controlled delivery' through the same
network claims that British drugs liaison officers forced him to entrap
potential dealers. Hussain Shah says that lie was promised immunity from a
smuggling charge involving three kilos of heroin if he would take part in
the operation. He claims that he had been set up by customs on the original
charge and that they then reneged on his agreement. Shah says that he
initiated several deals in Pakistan but when he returned to Britain he was
arrested and convicted.

Shah, convinced that he has been double-crossed, refused to give evidence in
the prosecutions of five men and as a result two cases involving 55 kilos of
heroin with a street value of UKP5.5m collapsed.

Shah's lawyer, Mohammed Rafique, argues that people are being set up in
deals which would never have taken place without the encouragement of
Customs and Excise. Senior customs sources say that investigations of these
cases have shown no impropriety.

Checked-by: "Rolf Ernst"