NSW Health Minister Jillian Skinner has convened an urgent meeting to discuss upgrading security in the state’s hospitals after an ice-crazed patient allegedly attempted to shoot dead a police officer. Continue reading Calls To Increase Hospital Security After Police Officer Shot In Sydney Hospital
State Crime Command’s Organised Crime Squad together with the NSW Crime Commission has been investigating an alleged ‘ice’ (methylamphetamine) manufacturing operation at Greendale.
About 9.40am on Friday 21 August 2015, police arrested a 39-year-old South-Wentworthville man at Burwood and seized $30,000 from his vehicle.
A second man, aged 43 and from Greendale, was arrested at his home, with a search warrant conducted at the property a short time later.
A large-scale clandestine drug laboratory was located in a shed at the rear of the property and processed by officers from the Drug Squad’s specialist Chemical Operations Team.
The laboratory was inactive at the time of the search, but numerous chemicals and equipment used in the manufacture of prohibited drugs were located. Police also seized 15kg of ‘ice’ and more than half a kilogram of pseudoephedrine.
A Ruger-brand .22 rifle and silencer, as well as approximately 1000 rounds of ammunition, were located and seized.
Read the full announcement.
Up to half of offenders locked up are testing positive to methamphetamine use or admit they use the drug, police data has revealed.
As police are on the frontline of the ice epidemic, Australia’s largest and longest survey of police detainees across Australia has confirmed ice use is continuing to rise.
Continue reading Ice Epidemic Exposed: More Than Half of Sydney’s Criminals Use Methamphetamines
More than 80 per cent of police feel vulnerable or at risk while on the job, a new survey has revealed.
Three quarters of respondents to the Police Association of Victoria’s Priority Policing Issues Survey listed drugs – ice in particular – as a key crime issue facing police today.
Some 83 per cent of the 3000 respondents to the union’s survey also said they believed current levels of substance abuse had made their job different than it was three years ago.
Five Mildura police officers faced months of health tests for Hepatitis and AIDS after restraining a man covered in his own blood in May.
Read more in Sunraysia Daily.
Victoria Police figures show an average 38 drivers a week were detected on the drug, a more than 30 per cent increase on 2013.
Overall, more than 3500 drug affected drivers were caught on the state’s roads in 2014, up almost 1000 in a year.
Victoria Police drug driving detections in 2014:
Total: 3501.
Read more in Herald Sun.
Police Minister Liza Harvey made the announcement on Sunday as part of the state government’s wider meth enforcement action plan that strives to stamp out the drug from WA streets.
WA has the highest methamphetamine use at 3.8 per cent of the population over the age of 14, compared to the national average of 2.1 per cent.
Ms Harvey said meth teams within the organised crime squad would also target drug dealers in metropolitan and regional WA.
WA Police Commissioner Karl O’Callaghan agreed that something had to be done to attack the “pathogen” which is “infecting” every part of the community.
Read more in The Australian.
Police have revealed the number of clandestine laboratories busted across Queensland has plummeted by 100 – or 27 per cent – in just two years, with most labs located being classified as “inactive”.
“The evidence suggests the labs were previously used to cook up illicit drugs and people have been storing them due to the availability of amphetamine-type substances,” the head of the state’s Drug and Serious Crime Group, detective Superintendent Jon Wacker said.
Last year, 279 illicit labs were detected across the state, compared with 379 in 2012.
Preliminary data suggests the trend is set to continue in 2015, with 121 labs busted so far at a rate of about 17 a month.
Read more in The Australian.
The ice scourge is fuelling escalating attacks on our police, with almost three-quarters of officers assaulted on the job in the past three years.
The drug is having a dangerous impact on front-line members, making criminals more violent and giving them “superhuman” strength.
In one instance, seven officers were needed to restrain a suspect high on the drug. Even capsicum spray is often ineffective.
Police Association of Victoria research, based on the responses of more than 3500 serving members, shows 90 per cent believe violence towards them has increased since 2012 — and 80 per cent feel more vulnerable and at risk. In recent cases:
Victoria Police said in a statement: “The unpredictable and often violent side-effects of ice use means our officers are being regularly confronted with dangerous situations during the course of their duties.
“While our members accept inherent risks involved in protecting the community, it is not acceptable for anyone to be assaulted at work.”
Read more in News.com.au.
Source: www.news.com.au
Drug use in the Highlands and plans for a new police station were a high priority for leading police representatives during a visit to Bowral Police Station.
Minister for Police and Deputy Premier Troy Grant visited the station with Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione on Wednesday.
Mr Grant said he was impressed by the men and women at Bowral Police Station who were “extraordinarily proud to serve this community”.
He said their work and dedication was reflected in the region’s statistics.
“The crime statistics in this area are incredibly positive, and we have local police who care about the community,” he said.
The $14.85 million dollar police station project proposed for the Southern Highlands is still in the planning stage.
Read more in Southern Highland News.
Source: www.southernhighlandnews.com.au
A disturbing interim report into methamphetamine use has revealed Australians consume more ice than any other country.
But the residents of one central New South Wales town aren’t prepared to wait for the National Ice Taskforce to act. They’re taking matters into their own hands.
The ice scourge is so bad in Wellington, population 4540, it has earned the nicknamed the South Pole.
“We all walk past drug dealers every day. You know, we’re related to drug dealers, we have associations with them, we love — we love our people … we just don’t love what they do,” Wellington Land Council’s Leanne Stanley told ABC’s 7.30.
“We’ve just become immune to it and that it’s not something that — it’s not like, ‘Oh, my goodness!,’ a big deal. It’s like, ‘Oh, there’s a syringe.’ Go and grab a bottle, what have you, to pick it up.”
Read more in The Daily Telegraph.
Source: www.dailytelegraph.com.au
