Australia is seen as an attractive target for criminal organisations involved in maritime drug trafficking due to the high price of drugs in Australia, and high demand for drugs in Australia. To do this, they demand a clear knowledge of the states carrier policy that includes aquatic ports, platforms, ways, railway routes, and terminals. By contrast, cannabis users have the least evidence of exceeding the thresholds, with no instance where a cannabis user consumes more than the trafficable quantity and only one instance where the maximum purchased exceeded the trafficable threshold quantity. Trafficking in a Controlled Drug - Armstrong Legal It is thus hoped that the data herein will help build threshold systems that adopt and deliver more proportional, just and equitable responses to Australian drug offenders. Drug trafficking in Australia is deemed a very serious offence, one for which legislators and courts have ruled general deterrence is paramount and little mercy should be shown (Clune [1989] VR 567, OBryan and Marks JJ, 576). In August 2018, the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission (ACIC) published a report that detailed some of the groups money laundering and drug trafficking activities. These border controlled drugs and precursors, along with offences and penalties can be located under Part 9 Section 307 Criminal Code Act 1995. Australia is strongly committed to countering people smuggling and human trafficking. Nicholas Cowdery is from the Faculty of Law, The University of New South Wales. February 16, 2023. https://studycorgi.com/high-level-drug-trafficking-in-australia/. Australian threshold quantities for 'drug trafficking': Are they This study was funded by a grant from the Commonwealth of Australiathe Criminology Research Grants. Lee, 65, is a former prison mate of Tse's suspected of being involved in drug trafficking for four decades. Sadeera S. - Co-Founder - 7Ocean Innovations | LinkedIn The specific threshold quantities employed vary by drug type, by jurisdiction and whether they are measured in terms of the pure chemical compound of a drug (pure grams) or, more commonly, in terms of pure chemical and any inert substances and fillers that are added before sale on the street (mixed grams or admixtures). Model Criminal Code Officers Committee (MCCOC) 1998b. While the Silk Road was taken down in 2013 research has highlighted the ineffectiveness of police to affect the market. Such assistance is very significant because the arrest of drugs at the borders of the sea gives the chance to seize illicit materials in the most immediate way, as a result, it will reduce supplies to Australia. Such people often work in groups, and only the detention of all participants will reduce the level of illegal substances. In some cases, Indigenous and local groups were working with international cartels to develop home-grown production facilities. Nevertheless, this is the best available data to date and provides considerable insight into the Australian drug trafficking threshold system. From opium to marijuana to cocaine, a variety of substances have been illegally imported, sold and distributed throughout U.S . The surveys also omit users who consume substances less frequently. After reaching Vietnam, part of the drugs headed to sea from Ho Chi Minh City's Cat Lai port, bound for Manila. International drug bust nets $677 million of cocaine bound for Australia Operation Shenzi was a joint Australian Federal Police, Australian Border Force, Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission and Western Australia Police Force investigation carried out in 2016, which culminated in the arrest of 14 people who were either crew members of the mother ship Mega Profit . Australia News. Hughes C & Ritter A in press. Drug trafficking is a global illicit trade involving the cultivation, manufacture, distribution and sale of substances which are subject to drug prohibition laws. Page Last Updated: A Gold Coast man charged with trafficking several drugs - including cocaine and MDMA - as part of an organised crime network has fronted court for the first time. (2023, February 16). In Papua New Guinea, there are no laws that prohibit the production, sale or use of methamphetamines, making it a key location to transit drugs to Australia. In another operation, the AFP identified 55 people as potentially involved in an Australian cartel run out of Perth. A 47-year-old man from Queensland and a 64-year-old man from South Australia were arrested at Henley Beach and have been charged with trafficking a large commercial quantity of a controlled drug. Drug Trafficking In Australia Essay Sample The person is deemed to have supplied the drugs based only on weight.2 No other evidence is required. At the same time, it was verified that such methods facilitated the detention of a smuggler at the border by gathering information and using specially trained dogs to search for narcotics (Man jailed for role in 300kg cocaine import to Victoria, 2021). This is particularly when compared with the sanction for simple use or possessiona maximum of two years imprisonment or a more probably, a simple caution or diversion (and no criminal record; Hughes & Ritter 2008). Crackdown operations. The current data suggests a small but not insignificant proportion of heroin users are affected. Former cop Thomas Booker apologises over sophisticated online drug Break the link between illicit drugs and social media: UN-backed report He said this was becauseAustralia and New Zealand were small,geographically isolated markets, which pushed up the price. Concealment techniques for the drugs often change but the use of clothing items to conceal drugs is a feature of the syndicates methods, the documents reveal. Of particular note here are New South Wales and South Australia where users risk exceeding the thresholds for consumption or purchase of three different drugsMDMA, methamphetamine and/or cocaine. At the same time, there is an opportunity to take part in a common operational struggle against narcotics trafficking. In fact, prescription drugs are some of the pricier drugs out there. In one operation, the AFP and their Colombian counterparts focused on a cartel moving large quantities of cocaine (up to 500 kilograms) to Europe or Africa (as intermediate countries) where it is broken up into small quantities and forwarded to other countries including Australia. That said, they biggest determinant of risk is the state. 4 Drugs and Schools: Legal Issues the duty is clearly to take reasonable care to avoid harm and to take positive action to prevent injury; and the duty is not that of strict liability like WorkCover which provides automatic compensation to workers injured at work, without any negligence having to be proved. Table 1 outlines the trafficable threshold quantities for heroin, methamphetamine, cocaine, MDMA and cannabis. The broader project examined this issue in two different wayswhether the thresholds are designed to filter traffickers from users and whether they enable appropriate sanctioning of traffickers of different controlled drugs. The kingpin received $100 million in tracked international transfers in the first four months of 2019 alone. Instances of exceeding the thresholds are also greater when examining practices of regular users, rather than irregular users, and for considering patterns of heavy use, rather than patterns of typical use. Information Publication SchemeAccess to Information, Trends & issues in crime and criminal justice. Australian bikie gangs smuggling in methamphetamine from Afghanistan Web. He will be sentenced at a later date. Many overseas police agencies are also affected. However, it is also clear that the level of risk can be mitigated by better design. In this study, the authors use data on patterns of drug user consumption and purchasing to evaluate Australian legal threshold quantities to see whether Australian drug users are at risk of exceeding the thresholds for personal use alone. A Documentary About 2 Canadians Arrested For Drug Trafficking - Narcity At times, these activities can undermine the national economy (for instance, by contributing to an overvalued exchange rate). "High-Level Drug Trafficking in Australia." There are 5 different quantity ranges under the Drug Misuse and Trafficking Act. Get it here. The kingpin and an accomplice are subject to Interpol blue notices. The report also found thatcross-border efforts to police drug trafficking hadbeenundermined bya disconnectbetween regional and national law enforcement, anddisparity in capacity across agencies,which haderoded trust and intelligence-sharing between them. Caitlin Hughes, Alison Ritter and Benjamin Phillips are from the Drug Policy Modelling Program, National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre, The University of New South Wales. Findings from the Illicit Drug Reporting System (IDRS). The charges relate to his operation of an online 'dark web' drug outlet called "Underline Cost.". Thus, preventive measures will make it possible for drug traffickers to understand that the Australian frontier is under close protection (Malins, 2019). Hiding skills include adapted vehicles with unique sections created to secrete contraband, elusive transportation routes, and covert arrangements with monetary organizations to wash money from illicit activities. Queensland employs prescribed quantities in a different waytriggering penalties equal to drug trafficking, rather than an actual charge or sanction as a drug trafficker (Drug Misuse Act 1986 (Qld)). Secret agents targeting drug cartels in Australia exposed in data hack. Drug trafficking and money laundering are global issues that are interconnected. Each triggers increasingly severe penalty ranges that can be applied, such as up to 15 years imprisonment for a trafficable quantity and life imprisonment for a large commercial quantity in New South Wales (Drug Misuse and Trafficking Act, 1986 (NSW)). Proponents of the use of threshold quantities argue that they are the optimal means to guarantee that drug offenders receive the sanction that they deserve (MCCOC 1998b; Sentencing Council 2011). One group is allegedly linked to a Queensland accounting firm that caters to Spanish speakers, and an Australian man with links to the Bandidos.Credit: The leak sheds light on the vast scale of drug importation into Australia and the webs of businesses such as gyms, luxury car dealerships, hairdressers and a nightclub set up to launder drug money. The IDRS and EDRS are national monitoring systems that survey regular (at least monthly) drug users on an annual basis. Meanwhile, "narco-corruption" in the Pacific "compromised institutions and individuals across key agencies, such as customs, policeand immigration,and undermined the rule of law". The series follows Lagac, who was labelled as a "major drug dealer," and her life back in Canada after she spent several years in prison in Australia. Metric 2: User patterns of purchasing; that is, quantity of drugs that a user is likely to purchase for personal use. For each state, the ability of the legal threshold to successfully filter out drug users from drug traffickers (ie the reasonableness of the assumption that all who exceed the trafficable threshold warrant severe charge/sanction for trafficking) was examined using two metrics of the quantity of drug a user is likely to possess for personal use alone: Metric 1: User patterns of use; that is, quantity of drugs that a user is likely to possess for a single session of personal use.