Police face cannabis charges

[Tom]

FOUR Victorian detectives seized cannabis worth $100,000 in a fake drug bust and gave the drugs to a criminal to sell, a jury has been told.

 

The police officers today faced the first day of their Victorian County Court trial for allegedly stealing the cannabis and involving themselves in a conspiracy to sell the haul.

Detective Sergeant David John Waters, 44, Detective Sergeant Glenn Saunders, 44, Detective Senior Constable Peter John Alexander, 37, and Detective Senior Constable Stephen Russell Campbell, 35, have all pleaded not guilty to charges of theft and conspiracy to traffic cannabis.

 

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Crown prosecutor Colin Hillman SC told the court Saunders was tipped off by an informer that he was meeting a drug dealer to buy $100,000 worth of cannabis at the carpark of St Kilda marina on May 10, 1999.

 

Mr Hillman said Saunders and the other three officers, who all worked at St Kilda police station, went to the marina that night and intercepted the drug exchange.

 

The court heard the drug dealer was questioned, police took the cannabis from his vehicle, his details were taken and he was told to leave.

 

Mr Hillman told the jury the drugs were then given to the informer to sell.

 

Duncan Allen SC, for Det-Sgt Saunders, told the court no cannabis was seized in the operation and Det-Sgt Saunders was not involved in a conspiracy.

 

Lawyers also told the court their clients performed a lawful police operation and found no cannabis.

 

Det-Sen-Constable Alexander's lawyer, Andrew McKenna, told the court the prosecution's case relied heavily on a conversation with a "manipulative and deceitful criminal".

 

Mr Hillman told the court the police officers were in a position to be "supremely confident that they would never be found out" by stealing drugs from a drug dealer.

 

"They were entitled to think they wouldn't be found out. If you take drugs from a drug dealer who is he going to complain to?" Mr Hillman asked the jury.

 

He said it was only by the "merest chance" that the officer's alleged activities were found out.

 

The telephone conversations of the informer were being monitored by police investigating the murders of police officers Gary Silk and Rodney Miller, the court was told.

 

The prosecution played a telephone conversation to the jury in which it is alleged the informer told Det-Sgt Saunders there would be a meeting at St Kilda marina on the night of the police sting.

 

The trial before Judge Jim Duggan continues tomorrow.

 

Author:Mariza Fiamengo

Date:May 04, 2005

Source:AAP

Copyright:Copyright 2005 News Limited.