Review of the Police Powers (Drug Premises) Act 2001 - NSW ...

7.5.2. Views on the level of drug supply being targeted in Cabramatta
When asked what level of the drug trade they believed that the Act was being used to target in Cabramatta, detectives who had used
the legislation said the street-level. 620 Senior police in Cabramatta also put forward this view. According to a former Crime Manager from
Cabramatta, the Drug Premises Act had targeted the lower levels of the drug trade in Cabramatta.
We certainly only operated at lower maybe to medium level. Operations had the focus of being on-going and consistent and
flexible, so we wouldn’t have been able to keep the pace up of the operations to disrupt the drug trade if we targeted individuals per
se, as in high level. If that was the case, then we’d require the assistance of South East Asian Crime or the Drug Squad to come in
at that level. 621
As the above comments illustrate, resource availability at the LAC level was cited as one reason why the law was being used to target lowlevel
dealing. A previous commander of Cabramatta LAC also believed that this was the case.
The priority for me was in fact street-level dealing. As a local area commander, you’ve got responsibility for that street, and as
in some cases, middle level drug dealing, and then of course, as it progresses up, there’s the more specialised areas who are
properly resourced, and who have the time, and not the competing priorities that a LAC has. 622
Another reason put forward for the fact that the law was being used to target low level drug supply was that, according to police, drug
premises in Cabramatta were part of the lower, and not higher levels of the drug market. A former Cabramatta Crime Manager, who
believed that the drug trade consists of three levels - high, medium and low - was asked where drug premises would be placed in the
overall structure of the drug trade in Cabramatta:
Drug premises would sit in, I would say, at middle to low. Certainly the drug premises do require a certain amount of organisation,
because you need to have access to the unit in the first place, particularly to lease them. Those that staff them might be a little
below mid level, somewhere between that gap between middle to low, because the middle level will probably try and protect
themselves, a little bit more organised… [Drug premises are] middle level, staffed by low level. 623
Other police we spoke to said that high level drug suppliers were more likely to use safe houses than drug premises to store large
quantities of drugs. 624 Safe houses are usually defined as places that are used for the storage of drugs, but not for distribution or supply. In
the NSW Police submission to our discussion paper, it was noted that the Drug Premises Act may be more effective against medium and
low level suppliers, because high level suppliers are “unlikely to risk police scrutiny by allowing their premises to be used for supply”. 625
In their submission to our discussion paper, the NSW Users and Aids Association (NUAA) commented that the descriptions of drug
houses in the Cabramatta Report on Progress 626 that was released in April 2002, indicated that the law was targeting low level drug
supply. NUAA argued that the types of items seized on drug premises also suggested this:
Descriptions of drug houses by police indicate that police view drug houses as “generally filthy with decaying food scraps” and
where “used and unused items of drug paraphernalia such as syringes, swabs, foil, scales and balloons are scattered about”.
Descriptions are indicative of lower level shooting rooms and houses where smaller amounts of drugs are sold and used. Play
stations and VCRs have been found instead of the more sophisticated computer records describing drug sales and manufacture,
listed in the Act. One can not easily picture the “drug barons” and “Mr Bigs” hanging out in such surroundings. 627
A health worker from Cabramatta commented in a submission to our discussion paper that the “only people I am aware of that have been
charged with being on a drug premises are those that street deal or deal enough to maintain their own needs. None of these people have
money or appeared to have any assets.” 628
We examined 80 court transcripts relating to people who had been charged with drug premises offences in Cabramatta. A history of
drug use or addiction was noted in relation to 25 defendants. It is important to note, however, that information of this kind does not always
emerge at court. Some transcripts contained no discussion of the personal history of the defendant.
As we noted in the chapter “Targeting drug supply”, legal practitioners and another drug advocacy group, while not specifically referring to
Cabramatta, were also of the view that the Drug Premises Act was targeting low level drug supply. 629
620 Focus group, Cabramatta police, 2 July 2003.
621 Interview, former crime manager, Cabramatta LAC, 21 August 2003.
622 Interview, former Commander, Cabramatta LAC, 22 August 2003.
623 Interview, former crime manager, Cabramatta LAC, 21 August 2003.
624 Interview, Commander of the Drug Squad, and other interviews.
625 NSW Police, Submission, received 12 August 2003.
626 NSW Government, Cabramatta Report on Progress, April 2002.
627 Submission, NSW Users and Aids Association. received 5 August 2003.
628 Cabramatta Health Worker, Submission, received 30 August 2003.
629 These submissions were from the Law Society of NSW, the Legal Aid Commission and Family Drug Support.
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NSW Ombudsman
Review of the Police Powers (Drug Premises) Act 2001