CAB COMPANY OWNERS QUESTION DRUG STING

The association that represents the city's 2,000 cabbies is
questioning a Vancouver police charge that some taxi drivers are
working as "middle men" in drug deals in the Downtown Eastside.

John Palis, executive director of the Vancouver Taxi Association, said
the police department's taxi squad should have contacted management of
the city's four companies if it suspected such activity is occurring.

"If the police department is saying there's a growing problem, how
come they haven't spoken to the cab companies?" said Palis, also the
general manager of Yellow Cab.

Palis' comments come after police conducted a sting operation Sunday
afternoon that led to the arrest of two Black Top cabbies and two
alleged drug dealers.

In two similar incidents, two undercover female cops hailed cabs in
the Hastings and Lakewood area and told the drivers they wanted to buy
"rock" (crack cocaine), said Const. Anne Drennan, a media liaison
officer for the police department.

The cops were driven a short distance west along Hastings, into the
heart of the drug dealing core, where both cabbies "signaled" to
alleged dealers on sidewalks to approach the cab, Drennan said.

The alleged dealers then handed over drugs to the cops through the
windows of both cabs. Police arrested the drivers and alleged dealers
shortly after the transactions.

Four men are now facing charges of trafficking in cocaine.

Drennan wouldn't say if the drivers-whom she described as "middle
men"-were getting paid for allegedly delivering clients to the
dealers, nor would she comment on the relationship between the four
men.

Police set up the sting after they noticed frequent drug deals
occurring in the Downtown Eastside involving people sitting in cabs.

"Our officers working in the Downtown Eastside have been seeing this
more and more lately, where cabs are coming into the area and
facilitating drug deals," she said. "And as it became an increasingly
serious problem, it was felt that we should take some kind of action."

Police have identified other cab companies allegedly involved in drug
deals, but Drennan wouldn't name them. Vancouver's four cab companies
are Black Top and Checker (one company), Yellow Cab, Vancouver Taxi
and MacLure's.

"We know there are many, many, many really good hard-working people in
those cabs, but it's one of those things where there's some bad apples
in the bunch. And we're hoping to weed a few of them out, and give the
others fair warning that we're out there watching."

In response to Palis' comments about police not contacting the
companies before Sunday's sting, Drennan said "we don't warn people
necessarily that criminal activity is taking place and then kill a
sting operation."

Drennan noted the police department's taxi squad deals mainly with
licensing of the city's cabs.

Though Palis agrees any cabbie participating in criminal activity
should be barred from the taxi industry, he isn't so sure the police's
version of the sting is accurate.

After speaking with Ted Allen, general manager of Black Top cabs,
Palis said "it sounds like the drivers were rather well encouraged by
the decoys [cops] to do these things."

Allen didn't return calls to the Courier.

Black Top cabbie Surinder Dhadli, who was parked outside Canada Place
Thursday waiting for a fare, said the police sting now paints cabbies
as "bad guys."

"Cabbies are being made a scapegoat. Everybody knows drugs are sold in
that area. I don't think these [fellow drivers] are guilty of
anything. Maybe the police should be chasing the guys who are bringing
the drugs into this country."