DRUG EMPIRE SMASHED

Ottawa At Nexus Of Global Narcotics Ring Targeted In Huge Bust

HUNDREDS OF police and drug enforcement officers swooped down on an
elaborate Ottawa-based international crime network yesterday. Executing a
wave of early morning raids in cities across North America, they decimated
a drug-running and money-laundering ring that stretched from California and
the U.S. eastern seaboard to Toronto, Vietnam and other parts of Southeast
Asia.

The massive joint-forces operation, involving 64 federal, state, provincial
and local law enforcement agencies throughout Canada and the U.S., netted
an estimated 170 arrests, including at least 29 in the capital. Police
seized more than $8 million in the popular club drug ecstasy and marijuana,
shut down numerous grow operations and crippled a cartel they say laundered
millions of dollars in crime proceeds each month.

At the forefront of yesterday's startling developments were the arrests of
alleged ringleaders Mai Le, 38, a Vietnamese national who police say
quietly operated in the sanctuary of innocuous local businesses and Ze Wai
Wong, 49, a Toronto resident who authorities confirmed yesterday had been
deported to his native China in the late 1990s.

Calling her the "queen bee" of the criminal organization who "had a lot of
people working for her," police said Le "didn't always get her hands dirty,
but she was supervising what was going on." Although she has lived in
Ottawa for several years, RCMP Staff Sgt. Jacques Lemieux said her alleged
criminal activities first came to police attention five years ago.

Arrested At Home

She was arrested yesterday morning in her posh Prince of Wales Dr. home and
later appeared calm and confident at a special show-cause hearing. Eight
key players in her organization -- all family members -- were among the
more than three dozen area suspects swept up in the raids.

In Ottawa alone, officers conducted 32 searches on a number of area
residences, businesses and bank accounts. Investigators shut down eight
complex grow operations in residential neighbourhoods across the city and
seized more than $1 million in cash, more than 1,000 marijuana plants,
$100,000 in growing equipment and a number of computers. Police searches
were continuing last night and those numbers were expected to rise.

The Canadian arm of the operation, dubbed Project Codi, involved Ottawa
police, the RCMP, the OPP and the Canadian Border Service Agency.
Simultaneous joint forces operations -- Project Okapi in Toronto and
Operation Candy Box in the U.S. -- also drew on the assistance of Ontario's
Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit, the FBI, DEA, IRS and other
police services in the U.S.

Project Okapi resulted in eight arrests in Toronto, with three additional
arrest warrants issued. Operation Candy Box collared 124 suspects in 16
U.S. cities including Houston, Los Angeles, Boston and New York.

"Probably the most significant aspect of today's operation is that in a
single wave of co-ordinated arrests, Canada and the U.S. were able to shut
down not just one criminal group but a whole network of these groups," RCMP
assistant commissioner Gessie Clement told a news conference in Ottawa. "In
doing so, we've taken out people at all ranks, from the senior executives
who planned the strategy all the way to the front-line operators."

She credited the Ottawa Police Service for initiating the investigation.

"What began as an intelligence investigation into the problem of indoor
marijuana grow operations in Ottawa quickly grew into national and
international investigations," Clement said. "In October 2002, Chief Vince
Bevan rallied the RCMP and OPP to pull together our expertise and our
resources."

Spurred by the diligence of Ottawa police drug officers, the investigation
has catapulted the entire force into the international limelight, Bevan
said. Their innovative approach, he added, produced results.

"What we have demonstrated is this way is far more effective by tracking
the product, tracking the money," he said, adding yesterday's raids
eliminated the prospect of violence that illegal grow operations often breed.

Major Network

According to Canadian and U.S. court documents Wong, is alleged to be a
major distributor of ecstasy on both sides of the border. Le is accused of
directing the money-laundering operation that repatriated the drug proceeds
of Wong's organization and of other traffickers. Documents suggest U.S.
money remittance firms -- companies which transfer funds internationally --
were used to launder the proceeds. It is alleged the defendants made large
cash deposits into the U.S. banking system while disguising the source.

"As an organization, they managed to launder $5 million US each month,"
Bevan said. "There was a common thread throughout that leading back to
Ottawa -- a nondescript local business was found to be central to a major
criminal organization with ties to the U.S. and into several Pacific Rim
countries."

Millions Of Pills

U.S. authorities said Operation Candy Box revealed that bulk quantities of
ecstasy were being produced in clandestine Canadian labs -- three of which
were raided and dismantled last August. Authorities also identified a large
network of drug couriers who allegedly used sophisticated vehicles to
transport currency and ecstasy. In one incident, border officials searched
a Canada-bound vehicle at Burlington, Vt., and discovered $750,000 US
concealed in the fuel tank. Operation Candy Box investigators say the
organization could distribute up to one million ecstasy tablets per month
in the U.S. and Canada.

"The importance of today's operation cannot be overstated," Deputy U.S.
Attorney General James Covey said in Washington. "Through the work of many
different agencies, we have achieved a top-to-bottom decimation of a
dangerous drug organization and a complementary attack on the fuel that
drives the organization -- their money."

DEA Special Agent Anthony Pratapas called the Ottawa-based organization a
"full-blown criminal machine."

"The size of the Wong and Le enterprise illuminates the reality we are
continuing to fight: The scope of the demand for this drug," Pratapas said
in Ottawa. "From their Canadian headquarters, the organization created
ecstasy death pills masquerading as harmless fun in our country to the tune
of about one million tablets a month. Too many of our children believe the
false claims of greed-driven traffickers who specifically market the drug
to our young people."

Le, whose case along with those of several others was adjourned to next
week, remains in custody. Numerous arrest warrants were outstanding last
night and several other suspects were to make court appearances today.

[SIDEBAR]

By The Numbers

- - Project Codi: 29 arrests in Ottawa, two in Montreal and one in Toronto.

- - Project Okapi: Eight arrests in Toronto, three additional arrest warrants
issued.

- - Operation Candy Box: 124 arrests in New York, California, Louisiana,
Alabama, Georgia, Florida, Minnesota, Texas, Massachusetts, Virginia, Iowa
and Utah.

- - Number of searches in Ottawa: 32 (includes residences, businesses and
financial institutions)

- - Number of local police officers involved in the raids: More than 300.

- - Amount of money seized locally: $1.1 million in cash.

- - Number of marijuana plants seized in Ottawa: More than 1,000.

- - Value of other items seized locally: $100,000 in growing equipment, two
sports cars and computers.

- - Since Project Codi's inception in Oct. 2002, police have confiscated
almost $2 million in laundered money and dismantled 35 grow houses. More
than $7 million in marijuana and growing equipment have been seized.