Police bust 'significant' P lab

Police display a haul of weapons and drugs, including two large rocks of crystal meth, inset, from a major bust on a Coromandel P lab. Photos / NZPA

Police busted a "very significant" methamphetamine laboratory in rural Coromandel on Tuesday, one of seven P labs closed down after a coordinated series of raids in the North Island.

The media was today given a peek at some of the items in the haul which included two "unusually large" rocks of crystal meth that weighed in at 83g, with a street value of about $83,000.

Powerful rifles, shotguns, crossbows, cannabis, ecstasy and an assortment of sophisticated laboratory equipment used to produce P were also on display.

Detective Inspector Greg Cramer, head of the operation, said the most significant find was a large P lab on an isolated property in the Kaimanawa Range, where hundreds of litres of chemicals used to make the drug were found.

"The potential production of that lab was very, very large," he said.

The lab was still being assessed and dismantled by police experts and Environmental Science and Research scientists.

Three children uplifted as a result of the raids were in Child Youth and Family Care and doing okay, he said.

"What is very apparent from all of this, and what we know of those who engage in the manufacture and distribution of methamphetamine, is that they're interested only in lining their own pockets and they have no consideration of the social harms that they cause."

Six clan labs were also found and dismantled in the Auckland suburbs of Ponsonby, Otahuhu, Glen Innes, Glenfield, and Waipu in Northland. The labs operated from a variety of residential, commercial and rural properties.

The intensive six-month investigation, known as Operation Slab, had been a great success and 11 arrests had been made, Mr Cramer said.

A 24-year-old Chinese man appeared in the Auckland District Court this morning charged with importing pseudoephedrine, a key ingredient in the manufacture of P.

Wei Hong Zheng faces two charges, one of possessing the drug for the purpose of supply and one of importing it.

He was bailed to live at an Auckland address with a curfew set between 9pm and 7am and told to surrender his passport to police.

He was to reappear in court with a Mandarin translator on September 9.

- NZPA