Organised crime gains foothold in NZ

The Police Association has warned that organised crime is gaining a foothold in New Zealand, largely due to the production of methamphetamine, P and ice.

But even stamping those drugs out would not be enough to get rid of the problem, association president Greg O'Connor said.

He said the association wanted a commission of inquiry to try to determine the scale of the organised crime problem.

Gangs that were traditionally enemies were working alongside one another for profit, people were becoming multi-millionaires and worse was to come as the market matured and gangs began to compete for territory.

The problem had started when biker gangs had jumped into an organised crime vacuum to produce and deal in methamphetamine, then pure methamphetamine (P) or its more concentrated form, ice.

"The biker gangs have become heavily involved in the methamphetamine trade right around the world - in the United States, Australia and Europe. However it has caused problems over there because you've always had existing organised crime," Mr O'Connor said.

"In New Zealand we've never had organised crime so these guys are filling a vacuum. So we've now got organised crime where none existed before."

He said a side-effect had been a lowering in street violence between gangs because it was bad for business. "There's nothing attracts police attention like violence and street violence. Plus there's been plenty [of business] for everybody."

Mr O'Connor said the Pakeha motorcycle gangs and ethnic gangs had put aside there traditional enmity only to do business.

"There's plenty of evidence that, for example, the Mongrel Mob are dealing with the white motorcycle gangs throughout the country ... [including] the Hell's Angels and the Headhunters in Auckland.

"And you've got the new thing, which are the Chinese gangs."

Although the gangs were now working alongside one another, Mr O'Connor warned that as business was squeezed, competition would be dealt with in the "traditional" way of organised crime.

He said the biker gangs in New Zealand had historically been involved in drugs, but mostly cannabis.

"Because of the nature of New Zealand it's so easy for anyone to go out and grow cannabis and get hold of it - the gangs never had a hold on [the entire market]. It's a very different thing with methamphetamine."

Mr O'Connor said gang members had never been allowed to use heroin because they knew how dangerous it was but the same had not been true for methamphetamine.

The Police Association had been warning since the mid-1990s that methamphetamine would become a major problem.

"The most important commodity in the early days was cooks. The gangs used to kidnap each other's cooks and hold them to ransom to get the cooking," Mr O'Connor said.

"The ingredients were quite easy to come by. The big difference between methamphetamine and every other drug is that it doesn't require anything to be grown.

"You compare that with cannabis, cocaine, heroin - they all require crops. Methamphetamine doesn't. Methamphetamine is 'grown' from what were, particularly in the 1990s, legal substances. It's a matter of turning a whole pile of legal substances into an illegal substance."

Now that there had been a clamp down on the ingredients such as pseudoephedrine from flu drugs, things were changing.

"The gangs have now gone to another stage of organisation by importing not only the core ingredients but latterly importing the actual made-up drug."

Assistant Commissioner Peter Marshall said police were investigating and prosecuting organised crime every week and several cases were before the High Court.

"New Zealand is a comparatively small country with a single national police service. There's not much that happens of significance without police getting to hear about it," he said.

"We are well aware of criminal trends and issues."

Police were working internationally with other enforcement agencies to combat organised crime, he said.

Mr Marshall also said the proposed civil assets forfeiture legislation would be useful in fighting crime.

"However, it should be remembered that organised crime feeds on markets for drugs and stolen property and this is the challenge for society as a whole, not just police, to address."

- NZPA