If Ottawa high schools make up a city within a city, then students' drug habits are reflecting the greater population.

While marijuana and alcohol continue to be the key vices for teens, a youth intervention co-ordinator with Ottawa police says cocaine is an emerging concern.

Louise Logue doesn't believe cocaine use is rampant among teens, but she's seen enough cases for her to put up warning flags.

"It's certainly enough to keep me in business," Logue says.

[continues 442 words]

"The manhunt is on," OPP Commissioner Julian Fantino said last night.

A massive police search was under way last night near Minden in cottage country to track down as many as 12 masked and camouflaged assailants who Fantino said beat up, shot at and held hostage six innocent victims who happened upon a $3-million marijuana grow operation.

"We will apprehend these criminals," Fantino vowed in calling for the courts to start treating illegal marijuana growing more seriously.

With the attackers still on the loose, police warned locals to not pick up any strangers.

[continues 189 words]

Bob Dolan wants to make a point - all costs associated with supplying syringes to injection drug users should be paid for by the province, not the local health unit.

Other health unit board members agreed and they decided to send a letter to the Ministry of Health to that effect.

The subject came up at the health unit's monthly board meeting this week when family health manager Bill Sherlock presented a report on injection drug users, of which there are an estimated 300 in Hastings and Prince Edward counties.

[continues 613 words]

A prominent Toronto lawyer has been cleared of charges that he smuggled marijuana to an inmate in the Don Jail.

Miles O'Reilly, 72, made reasonable inquiries to determine whether packages he handed to an inmate on Feb. 7, 2006, contained only tobacco, as he had been told, provincial court Justice Peter Wright ruled yesterday.

"I believe Mr. O'Reilly," Wright said in Superior Court in Newmarket. "I believe he did not know the packages he brought to the Don Jail contained contraband."

[continues 202 words]

Durham police want to thank a quick-thinking cabbie for helping to nab a fleeing suspect.

The incident came following a routine traffic stop in the Whites Rd. and Bayly St. area in Pickering early Wednesday morning, police said.

When the officer was placing the driver under arrest for possession of marijuana, a scuffle ensued and the suspect took off with handcuffs around one wrist.

The officer started to give chase on foot when a passing taxi driver pulled alongside and offered to assist.

[continues 79 words]

What Was Once Only a Big-City Phenomena Is Hitting Close to Home As Police Find They Are Dealing With a New Breed of Criminal on the Streets of Waterloo Region

The young men who push drugs on Waterloo Region's streets today are increasingly sophisticated, better armed and more prone to violence.

They represent a new breed of street-gang foot soldier and they're forcing local police to change their tactics.

That's the sober assessment of Staff Sgt. Daryl Goetz, the veteran commander of the Waterloo regional police criminal intelligence unit.

[continues 2222 words]

Stephen Harper's announcement Thursday of a new national drug strategy served at least one valuable purpose: It conclusively demonstrated that the prime minister knows nothing about drugs or drug policy.

The list of misinformed, misleading or nonsensical statements uttered by Mr. Harper is long and this space short, so let me skip quickly to the highlights.

. "If you are addicted to drugs, we'll help you," the prime minister declared, "and if you sell drugs, we'll punish you." This is an understandable sentiment. Dealers are victimizers. Addicts are victims. Punish one, help the other. It seems so obvious -- if you know nothing about illicit drugs.

[continues 776 words]

Susan and Sheila are mother and daughter. They live in a tidy house on a quiet street in a leafy part of town. Those are not their real names because everyone deserves a second chance.

Sheila is 18 years old, athletic, obsessive, articulate, intelligent. She got caught up in drugs. She is now in treatment in another province.

Susan is a good parent, sore of heart, baffled that she never saw it coming. She poured coffee in her living room the other day and said, "Sheila was a great student. Her marks were always in the 80s. She got a scholarship out of high school. I don't know how it got started. It turns out she was using for five years; alcohol, marijuana, ecstasy." There were other drugs.

[continues 510 words]

After about 200 drunken college students ran amok last week on Fleming Drive, a local councillor called for a satellite police station.

After a bunch of boozy high school students disrupted a football tournament and prompted the cancellation of some upcoming Friday night games, a local coach called for more security.

But nobody seemed to say anything about the real problem: How we tend to shrug and smirk and turn a blind eye to the ugly effects of alcohol.

Well, somebody wants to talk about it.

[continues 618 words]

John Turmel might better be named John Turmoil. Trouble often attends the independent candidate on the election trail. He was kicked out in the first 10 minutes of an all-candidates debate on cable television last week. Since then, he has not been invited to at least four other debates.

Not being invited hasn't stopped Turmel. On Thursday, he showed up at North Park Collegiate for a debate hosted by Brant Women in Action and the University Women's Club. He walked around the room complaining in a loud voice and insisted on taking a place at the debating table until two police officers arrived to escort him from the building.

[continues 429 words]

Using Afghan opium poppies for legal medicines is an interesting idea - -- but it would require real security

The rather recently arrived, but amply funded, Senlis Council has released the latest of its broadsides, promoting its "Poppy for Medicine" project, while at the same time slagging Canadian diplomacy in Afghanistan.

The striped-pants set probably shouldn't get their knickers in a knot though, since Senlis's treatment of CIDA and UNICEF was even more savage.

In fact, a fast tour through the reported e-mail exchanges between the Senlis field wallahs in Afghanistan and the local offices of CIDA and UNICEF suggests it's unlikely that anybody in Senlis has ever read Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends & Influence People.

[continues 635 words]

Public Urged To Report Suspicious Activity In Rural Areas

The Hamilton Police Service, Brantford Police Service, Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) and Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) joined forces recently to conduct a four-day outdoor marijuana eradication operation.

Crime Stoppers tips and information from investigations enabled VICE and Drug Green Team officers to seize more than 2,000 marijuana plants across the Golden Horseshoe and Southwestern Ontario.

Seven hundred plants were seized in Hamilton. Detective Emile Evangelista of the Green Team believes 30 per cent of that number was located in the rural areas of Flamborough.

[continues 279 words]

NIAGARA FALLS -- Niagara Regional Police say they will continue to crack down on drug use by students to keep the city's high schools safe.

Six Niagara Falls teenagers were arrested Sept. 21 for trafficking and using drugs near Stamford Collegiate while under the watchful eye of Niagara Regional Police. Police were in place Thursday and Friday of last week to monitor student activities after complaints from the community. It was during the school's lunch break Friday police said they observed a number of students distributing and smoking marijuana.

[continues 101 words]

ST. CATHARINES -- The fact a highly venomous Gaboon viper was found by Niagara Regional Police during a raid on a suspected drug dealer's home last Friday is not surprising, said a reptile expert with the Toronto Zoo.

These animals, though illegal in many municipalities, can be found all across Ontario, said Bob Johnson, the zoo's curator of reptiles and amphibians.

"Illegally, underground, somehow they're getting them," he said, referring to criminals and unlicensed owners.

"You can drive across the border, buy one, bring it back in your car and nobody would know the difference. But there are also probably people in Ontario breeding them that we don't know of.

[continues 550 words]

Canada's fire chiefs are calling for the government to restrict the sale of hydroponics equipment in an attempt to quash the proliferation of clandestine marijuana grow operations.

Such illegal operations have plagued Niagara Falls for years.

"These operations create a significant hazard for the community and for the health and safety of firefighters not only in Niagara, but across the country," Ontario Fire Marshal Pat Burke said Wednesday. More than 400 fire service officials from across Canada were in Niagara Falls this week for a national conference of the Canadian Association of Fire Chiefs.

[continues 320 words]

Departments Develop Protocol To Ensure Safety

The Pembroke city police and fire departments have developed a protocol for dealing with marijuana growing operations. Fire Chief Rheaume Chaput and Const. Dillon Gerundin of the city police outlined the protocol to the operations committee of city council recently.

The protocol covers a number of scenarios, including a fire in a grow op or providing for fire department support during police raids of grow ops. Const. Gerundin said houses or other buildings are modified to accommodate the growing operations.

[continues 447 words]

City's Crackdown On Grow Ops Doesn't Protect Medical Pot Growers

After three hours punching each other silly over issues like amending the fireworks bylaw, the licensing and standards committee is finally ready to hear my deputation September 11.

I'm here on behalf of the Canadian Cannabis Society to speak to the final agenda item: how the city plans to police pot and divvy up the proceeds of grow op busts.

At the start of the meeting, I hear chair Howard Moscoe say offhandedly that he's thankful no one is speaking on the proposed bylaw.

[continues 476 words]

I find it hard to believe that Alan Young could assert that the roadblock set up by police outside Hempfest had nothing to do with impaired driving (NOW, September 20-26).

I think it is a fair and safe assumption on the part of the police that the participants in Hempfest would be more likely than not to be driving under the influence.

Jacob Kojfman Toronto

[end]

You can't have a community unless people are talking to each other. So we applaud the move of Vanier residents on Emond Street for creating a Neighbourhood Watch and taking that first step.

The problems of Vanier are extensive. The neighbourhood has difficulties with drugs and prostitution. Before the Neighbourhood Watch event to be held in Emond Park, city workers were sent to ensure the greenspace was safe.

It took a crackhouse killing last year to get residents moving on a Neighbourhood Watch. In the best of areas, it is difficult to get a Watch program started. People are busy or don't care. In Vanier where you can add economic problems and the transient nature of renters to the mix, bringing people together is just that much more arduous.

[continues 343 words]

New Ottawa Police Unit Will Focus On Getting Highly Addictive Drug Off Downtown Streets

Ottawa Police are cranking up their war on crack with the creation of a new unit to tackle the drug head-on.

It couldn't come at a better time -- police say crack cocaine addicts are telling them the drug is being cut with methamphetamine to make it more addictive.

Police are expected to roll out the new unit in a matter of weeks following budget approval this morning. It will focus on downtown, including Elgin St. over to Island Park Dr., down to Carleton University and up to Wellington St. -- an area where 90% of all complaints are crack-related.

[continues 299 words]