High Level Copper Busted

[RobbieGanjaSeed]

I know it's not pot, ....this time...

But as I've ranted and raved a dozen times before, every bloody royal commision into drug laws in this country, and every commission into political and police corruption, have returned verdicts that drug laws need re-writing. that the prohibited stance of drugs facsilitates corruption at every level, and the harder they push (war on drugs. More like war on drug "users")...the more corruption that emitts.

 

There's gotta be better articles around, but here's one

 

 

Cop 'arrested over massive drugs plot'17:00 AEST Mon Jun 2 20082 hours 5 minutes agoBy ninemsn staff with wiresVIEWS: 0| FLOCKS: 0| 0 comments so farA high-ranking police officer has been arrested over a plot to import enough ephedrine to produce $120 million worth of ice, reports say.

 

The Daily Telegraph's website reports that Mark Standen, a top investigator at the NSW Crime Commission, has been arrested in Sydney over an alleged plot involving a crime syndicate from the Netherlands.

 

A police media representative was unable to comment on the report. A spokeswoman for the AFP said there was no information available at this stage.

 

If proven to be true, the plot would be one of the highest level cases of police corruption ever found in Australia, the Telegraph reports.

 

Standen's role with the Commission meant he was privy to all major state and federal drug operations.

 

The AFP placed the Crime Commission building into lockdown this afternoon as Standen's office was raided, the Telegrah reports.

 

They seized documents and technical equipment.

 

The commission's assistant director operations support, Alison Brook, confirmed a senior officer had been taken into custody by the AFP today.

 

"He was arrested by the Australian Federal Police and you should get further information from them," she told AAP.

 

Ms Brook said she had been aware the officer was under investigation prior to his arrest, but would not say when she first learned of the matter.

 

"I don't want to make any comments about our knowledge or otherwise," she said.

 

Ms Brook said the man had been employed by the commission since 1996.

 

When asked if he had been suspended from his position, she said: "He's just been arrested, we're dealing with that at the moment."

[Indycar]

Ahh well, I wonder Officer Scipione (NSW's police chief) would like to ask that corruption question to Dr Wodak, once again. One would imagine it wouldn't be at the top of his list of "must do" things.

 

A refresher to those that dunno wtf i'm on about... Scipione wants proof of drugs corruption

 

[freddie]

Corrupt cop! Hard to believe!

 

Ahh well, I wonder Officer Scipione (NSW's police chief) would like to ask that corruption question to Dr Wodak, once again. One would imagine it wouldn't be at the top of his list of "must do" things.

 

B)

[loylty gets u nothing]

thats fucking amazing

no half measures hey

bil

[s4l]

This article goes into more detail.

 

Les Kennedy, Kate McClymont and Dylan Welch

June 3, 2008

Source

Copyright © 2008. The Sydney Morning Herald.

 

 

A SENIOR officer with the highly secretive NSW Crime Commission, who has led some of Australia's biggest drug busts, has been charged over his alleged involvement in a $120 million international drug conspiracy.

 

Mark Standen, 51, an assistant director of investigations at the commission, was arrested as he worked at his desk yesterday over the plot to import chemicals from the Netherlands to manufacture methamphetamine, or "ice".

 

It is understood he may have been under investigation for the past 18 months to two years.

 

The arrest of Standen, a father from the Central Coast, stunned law-enforcement officers, who admired his investigative prowess.

 

His teams have also been involved in investigating alleged corrupt conduct by police.

 

The arrest is understood to be part of a series of co-ordinated raids in Europe, Thailand and Sydney. One report said about 150 police, including six SWAT teams, had raided homes and offices in four cities in the Netherlands last week and arrested 11 people.

 

Standen, who joined the NSW Crime Commission from the Customs Service, was arrested at his desk in the commission's Kent Street offices by members of an Australian Federal Police taskforce investigating the alleged drug conspiracy. The commission was the first agency to confirm the arrest last night, saying the Federal Police had also executed a warrant to search Standen's office in the 2pm raid on the commission premises - dubbed "the star chamber" by defence lawyers and alleged criminals taken there and compelled to give evidence in camera.

 

"They have been conducting an international investigation and they arrested Mark this afternoon," a spokeswoman for the commission said. She added that the head of the commission, Phillip Bradley, may make a statement today.

 

Standen, who had access to some of the country's most sensitive intelligence on investigations into organised crime groups, was taken to the Sydney headquarters of the federal police and then to the Sydney Police Centre.

 

Federal police cordoned off the commission offices and took a number of files from the premises. It is not known if Standen's home on the Central Coast was also raided.

 

Federal Police are understood to be in Amsterdam as part of the investigation. NSW police were quick to say that they had no information that "suggests any NSW police officer has been involved in any wrongdoing".

 

Standen's arrest follows criticism in recent years of some of the operations that he has been involved in, including a recent compensation payout of almost $10 million to a group of officers from a covert NSW police task force code-named "Bax" into organised crime in Kings Cross.

 

The officers, only one of whom was charged, fought for more than a decade to clear their names of any hint of corruption, allegations of which left their police careers wrongly in limbo.

 

In recent years Standen's name has featured in criticism from the courts or in evidence from those arrested.

 

In one the most controversial operations, police released seven kilograms of cocaine onto the streets in order to follow alleged drug networks, but recovered only one kilogram.

 

That operation, code-named Rhodium, targeted the import from South America of cocaine through a drug ring with links to Qantas baggage handlers, the Sydney underworld figure Michael Hurley, who died last year before he could be prosecuted. Hurley was one of the last of a group to be arrested, after almost a year on the run.

 

In July last year it was revealed that three federal police officers involved in the operation had been disciplined for their role in allowing cocaine to be sold but not retrieved. They were "counselled" for failing to follow "practices and processes" during the 2004-05 investigation.

 

Last December, the District Court judge Peter Zahra criticised the crime commission - and Standen in particular - describing its behaviour as "misguided" and "unacceptable" over an investigation into an allegation of jury tampering in a drug case that ended with a hung jury deliberating a drug conspiracy.

 

Shocked colleagues last night expressed disbelief at Standen's arrest. "Its crap, it has to be," one told the Herald.

 

"It is just unimaginable," said another, who added: "It's a pretty frightening development."

 

The arrest would have enormous ramifications for the crime commission, he said. Not only would there be a queue of criminals wanting to challenge the validity of their convictions, but Standen had been privy to the most sensitive information about organised crime in the country. If this was true, what followed was dreadful, he said.

 

There has been animosity between the commission and the federal police and last night some commission members were querying the federal police role in Standen's arrest.

[Tony2224]

WOW this situation reminds me of another time where america smuggled in drugs......look up ricky ross and danilo blandone. This is nothing new at all, the war on drugs does not attack the people who truly profit!

[RobbieGanjaSeed]

And if it doesn't ill-effect those who really make the money, and they also happen to be the guys who make the changes to laws...what chance does any change to the laws actually stand? Not without a lot of shoutting and screaming..

 

cheers

rob

[bufo marinus]

Oh this is gold well done you greedy pig You've helped our cause substantially. Dr Wodak should voice this as loud as he can to that dumb fuck Scipione and all his other detractors, what's that other silly bitches name? Amanda Devine?

Thanks for the post Rob

[MongyMan]

The arrest of Standen, a father from the Central Coast, stunned law-enforcement officers, who admired his investigative prowess.

 

Shocked colleagues last night expressed disbelief at Standen's arrest. "Its crap, it has to be," one told the Herald.

 

"It is just unimaginable," said another, who added: "It's a pretty frightening development."

 

Federal Police are understood to be in Amsterdam as part of the investigation. NSW police were quick to say that they had no information that "suggests any NSW police officer has been involved in any wrongdoing".

 

His teams have also been involved in investigating alleged corrupt conduct by police.

 

There has been animosity between the commission and the federal police and last night some commission members were querying the federal police role in Standen's arrest.

 

When I first heard about this on the news, my gut feeling was that he has trodden on the toes of bigger fish. Chances are he was doing his job too well and had to go. Going on some of whats in that artical I wonder if I'm that far off.

 

Peace MongyMan