RCMP BUST DRUG RING, SEIZE 200,000 MARIJUANA SEEDS

Montreal-Based Websites Known Around The World

MONTREAL -- Loyal customers around the world knew that Heaven's
Stairway was neither in the funeral business nor offering old Led
Zeppelin records for sale. In fact, police say, the Montreal-based
outfit was clear about its product: Marijuana seeds.

It ran an Internet business out of a Montreal apartment and grew it
into a multimillion-dollar concern, police say, that shipped
high-potency seeds across Canada, the United States and even Europe.
At least until late January.

Yesterday, the Mounties in Montreal announced they had busted
Heaven's Stairway, and shut down its six websites. In a series of
raids in late January, it arrested seven people and seized 200,000
marijuana seeds, along with bootie including $183,000 (U.S.) and
three gold bricks.

"This was a major and large-scale operation," Staff Sgt. Andre
Potvin, chief of operations for the Montreal drug section of the
RCMP, said in an interview. "It was centralized, very organized, and
active around the world."

The police allege that the business functioned like an efficient
import-export business, trading on the global reach of the Internet
and the international appetite for pot. In Montreal, members of the
organization imported seeds in bulk from suppliers as far as away as
Holland and New Zealand.

Employees picked up orders through Montreal post-office boxes,
according to police. Then they mailed off seeds in small packets to
customers around the world. The operation was able to process about
30 seed orders a day, averaging $100 each.

"They were doing millions of dollars of business a year," Staff Sgt.
Potvin said.

The RCMP said it seized enough seeds in its raids to supply about 500
cannabis greenhouses with 400 plants each -- enough to make 42 million joints.

Marijuana activist Marc-Boris St.-Maurice said marijuana-seed sales
operate within a legal vacuum in Canada, and police have generally
turned a blind eye to the practice. But Canadian law-enforcement
officials were pressed to act once sales spread beyond Canada's
borders, said Mr. St.-Maurice, national executive-director of the
National Organization of Reform of Marijuana Laws in Canada.

"Within Canada, no one raised an eyebrow. But it's embarrassing for
Canada to have citizen from here sending stuff to other countries.
When these seeds are going to the United States, where there's no
tolerance whatsoever, that gets a little dicey."

Richard Hratch Baghdadlian, 38, is accused of being the mastermind of
the organization. The seven suspects face a total of 49 charges,
including possession of cannabis seeds for the purpose of
trafficking, and if convicted could be imprisoned for 10 years.

Staff Sgt. Potvin said the Montreal mail-order operation had been
active since 1998, but the police began their investigation in
November, 2004. In all, seven investigators were assigned to the case
for 16 months.