Posted on: Monday, October 25, 2004
Asian ice dealers see state as target
By Peter Boylan
Advertiser Staff Writer
Drug trafficking organizations based in Asia are attempting to re-establish themselves in Hawai'i's illegal drug market because the price of a pound of crystal methamphetamine retails for double what it does on the Mainland, federal law enforcement officials said.
"Asia is a really growing problem for us," said Larry Burnett, director of the Hawaii High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, a partnership of federal, state and county law-enforcement agencies that counts 213 members. "We're just starting to see the beginnings of it. It is a huge potential problem."
Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, Filipino, Thai and Malaysian gangs recognize that a smaller amount of crystal methamphetamine, or "ice" will produce twice the profit in Hawai'i, federal agents say. The gangs are also targeting Guam and Saipan, because a pound of ice will sell there for quadruple the Mainland price.
"We have a target on us because the market is here," said Briane Grey, head of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's Honolulu district office. "If they (drug organizations) can get it (drugs) here they can sell their product for the price they're looking for."
According to the DEA, a pound of crystal meth retails in the western United States for $7,000 to $8,000. The same pound could fetch as much as $22,000 to $42,000 in Hawai'i. Ice is sold at the street level in quarter-gram, half-gram, gram, "teener" (1.75 grams), and "eight-ball" (3.75 grams) amounts. In Hawai'i, a quarter-gram retails for about $40, a half-gram costs $75 and a gram costs $100.
A quarter-gram that sells for $40 on Hawai'i streets costs roughly 70 cents to make in Asia.
Members of HIDTA's Foreign Interdiction Task Force have been scrambling to limit the opportunity for Asian traffickers by identifying shipments and fledgling networks, and stopping the drug flow whenever possible. In addition, HIDTA's executive board, made up of eight federal agency directors and eight state agency directors, has met with several high-ranking law-enforcement officials from Asia and the Pacific rim to discuss ways to work together and combat the problem before it becomes a trend.
"The best and most lucrative place to sell it (ice) in the U.S. is Guam and Hawai'i," Grey said.
While officials are reluctant to quantify the amount of methamphetamine from Asia being confiscated in Hawai'i, drug agents have given the potential problem a top HIDTA priority.
Cooperation among foreign governments and the United States is key when it comes to stopping multiple-drug organizations based out of Asia, law-enforcement officials say. Meetings with drug-enforcement officials from Asia and Pacific rim nations help HIDTA to better understand the character, motivation and goals of the organizations trying to infiltrate Hawai'i's market.
The visits, sponsored by the U.S. State Department, bring top drug-enforcement officials from Asia, New Zealand, Australia, and other Pacific rim countries to the United States to discuss strategy. Each foreign official starts in Hawai'i, then continues on to meetings on the West Coast before traveling to Washington, D.C.
HIDTA officials have met with Chinese officials previously and recently met with the New Zealand police commissioner.
On Nov. 7, HIDTA's board will meet with Dong Sheng, the deputy director general of the narcotics control department in the Yunnan Public Security Bureau. The province is on the front lines of China's drug war because it borders the notorious "golden triangle," the name given to the drug-producing plot of land between Laos, Myanmar and Thailand. Yunnan province shares a western border with Myanmar, and a southern border with Laos and Vietnam, and covers an area about the size of California.
Drugs produced in this part of Asia can end up in Hawai'i, law-enforcement officials said. In addition, super labs are popping up in the Philippines, Malaysia, Fiji and across the Pacific rim. Some of the product produced in these labs is destined for the United States where the price is right and the popularity is spreading, law-enforcement officials said.
In 2003, agents say, drug-enforcement officials from Australia and New Zealand contacted HIDTA with information about a ring of Vietnamese couriers smuggling ice made in China into the United States through Canada.
Shortly after receiving the tip, HIDTA members arrested a Vietnamese courier who came to Hawai'i from Canada. Ice from China was found in his possession. DEA officials would not disclose the man's name or details surrounding his arrest.
Other arrests this year highlight the emerging problem, narcotics agents say:
In April, Baron M.A. Suarez-Rothschild, otherwise known as "Dr. Wu," was arrested in Singapore after he allegedly tried to send 2 pounds of cocaine through the mail from Singapore to San Diego.
Law-enforcement officials characterized "Dr. Wu," named after a Steely Dan song, as the head of an elusive group of drug traffickers that distribute methamphetamine, cocaine, and marijuana in Hawai'i, Australia, Canada, and other Pacific rim countries.
Following Suarez-Rothschild's arrest, authorities in California and Hawai'i seized more than 13 pounds of cocaine, 2 pounds of methamphetamine, and about 30 pounds of high-grade marijuana. They also found about $747,000 in suspected drug proceeds and 20 weapons, including nine assault rifles.
As part of the operation, seven people in Hawai'i were indicted: Rayma Faalealea and Sefo Faalealea of Honolulu; Robert Linder of Pahoa; Brent Weber of Maui; Todd Takata of Kahuku; and Kimberly Deveraux and Douglas Secor of Hale'iwa.
Suarez-Rothschild's group allegedly distributed drugs throughout California, Canada, and Hawai'i, and purchased product from Mexico and Asia.
In June, a special law-enforcement task force that included agents from Australia and New Zealand, uncovered an illegal drug factory in Suva, Fiji, that was capable of producing $540 million worth of crystal methamphetamine. The product was slated for distribution to Australia, New Zealand and the United States.
The DEA's Grey said it is important to realize that organized crime groups based in Asia infiltrated Hawai'i's market during the late 1980s. It was then that Korean chemists brought crystal methamphetamine to the United States for the first time, he said.
Throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s, before the state's ice problem garnered national headlines, the majority of crystal meth coming into Hawai'i and the United States came from Asia. According to the DEA, starting in the late 1990s most of the ice coming into the islands was from superlabs in California and Mexico that were capable of keeping up with the skyrocketing demand.
In addition to being able to produce a high volume of product, the superlabs based in the United States had an easier time getting ice to Hawai'i aboard commercial airliners.
Paul Smith, professor of transnational security issues at the Asia Pacific Center for Security Studies, said what is happening in Hawai'i is indicative of what is occurring in island states throughout the Pacific. He said Asia's expanding drug problem is prompting transnational organized crime groups based in Asia to seek out soft targets in the form of small pacific island nations and the state of Hawai'i.
"It is always a potential problem because we have a huge market for this (ice) like we all know," Smith said. "Potentially if the local market cannot meet the demand and as police become more effective at busting the local labs they may create more of a market for the imported variety (of ice); that's the devil's dilemma that we have."
Reach Peter Boylan at pboylan@honoluluadvertiser.com or 535-8110.
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