Police say gangs still dealing in P

Rock legend Joe Walsh performed for the Mongrel Mob and Black Power last year at Otatara Pa. Picture / Hawke's Bay Today

After more than a year of listening to claims that gang leaders want their members to give up P, Hawkes Bay police say prominent gangs remain in control of methamphetamine dealing.

Napier CIB head Detective Senior Sergeant Bill Gregory said the gang influence was so strong it included a Mongrel Mob stranglehold over one Napier suburb.

"The Mob has got a pretty good control over Maraenui," he said.

"If you're going to deal in drugs in the area, you've got to have a pretty good sanction from them. That means buying off them, and dealing for them," Mr Gregory said.

However, the police's view is challenged by Hawkes Bay-based gang behaviour analyst Denis O'Reilly, who believes some progress has been made.

Mr O'Reilly has set up two meetings between rival Mongrel Mob and Black Power members in Hawkes Bay in the last 14 months.

The first was in October last year, when gang leaders sat with veteran American rock star Joe Walsh and denounced P at a rally at the historic Otatara Pa site near Taradale. It ended with patched members of both gangs performing a haka together.

The second was in March this year when members of both gangs took part in a conciliatory forum led by American-based New Zealander John Wareham in Hastings.

Mr O'Reilly conceded the philosophy had not been embraced by all overnight, but that was to be expected.

"I think there was a lot of goodwill euphoria, but then reality hit," he said, adding that some people had expected gang members to join forces with police, and could not accept there were ways of dealing with the problem outside the criminal justice structure.

"While the country is happy for resources to go to the police, there are limited resources for those trying to effect the same results outside the system," he said.

Some gang leaders and members had recognised the long-term damage caused by P and by being involved in its manufacture and distribution, but others had not, continuing to seek the financial rewards at great risk.

Where communities and families had stepped in to say "no", there had been success in tackling the problem.

He likened progress to that which followed the Ambury Park gang rape in Auckland. Gang rapes did not instantly disappear from the landscape, he said, but now rape featured very rarely in gang life, he said.

Mr Gregory said the problem remained despite a number of influential people in gangs being charged with offences involving P dealing.

There remained a lot of crime to support the use of methamphetamine.

"I made the point at the time last year that the proof of the pudding is in the eating," he said.

"I'll believe gangs are turning their backs on P when I see evidence of the effects of what they're doing.

"If the gangs pull out of all of their involvement with P, I would be the first to applaud them. Nothing is stopping them from deciding to have nothing to do with it."

- NZPA