COPS IN ECSTASY OVER BUST

'E' To $52.5m Tune Seized From Pianos

Local Mounties and customs agents are tickled over a massive drug bust that
hit the right chord when they found millions of dollars of ecstasy in three
pianos -- making it the biggest Canadian seizure of the drug.

"At more than $50 million, this will definitely make a major impact (on the
illegal drug trade)," said RCMP Cpl. Patrick Webb yesterday.

Customs inspectors intercepted 120 kg of ecstasy powder -- with an
estimated street value of $52.5 million -- hidden inside three upright
pianos on Oct. 16.

The instruments, from Frankfurt, Germany, were on their way to Vancouver
via Calgary.

But customs agents at the Calgary airport decided to open the crates the
pianos were in before allowing them to continue west.

The agents became suspicious of the pianos when something just didn't look
right, a Canada Customs and Revenue Agency spokesman said.

"They saw other things, but they noticed plywood on the back of the pianos
that wouldn't normally be there," said Gordon Luchia.

When agents removed the plywood, they found the ecstasy -- a
euphoria-inducing drug which has become popular with younger rave-goers --
in the ribs of the pianos.

RCMP were called and the dope was seized.

The pianos continued on to Vancouver where a man attempted to pick them up.

Kwong Yuen Chow, 40, of Richmond, B.C., was arrested in Vancouver Oct. 25
and charged with importation and possession for the purpose of trafficking.

Ecstasy is commonly sold in pill form and police suspect the powder was to
have been manufactured into pills -- about 1.5 million -- in the Vancouver
area, then sold.

"Not just locally, but to markets across Canada," Webb said.

Local Mounties are working with their counterparts in Vancouver and
Interpol in an effort to arrest others who are most certainly connected
with the shipment.

While officials said the bust won't dry up the market, at least it won't
end up in our teens.

"We are very pleased to have this off the street," said Suzanne Thrasher of
Canada Customs.

The next-largest bust of ecstasy in Canada happened May 24, 2001 -- when
more than 850,000 tablets of the popular rave drug were seized by the RCMP
at Montreal's Dorval Airport.

Carrying an estimated street value of $30 million, that was the biggest
ecstasy seizure in Canada at that time.