COKE FACTOR Y BUSTED; Detectives seize drugs worth e1.5million.

Byline: By JIMMY CUNNINGHAM

GARDAI smashed a cocaine-processing factory yesterday, seizing drugs worth e1.5million.

A 30-year-old man was mixing coke in a food blender when gardai burst through the door.

Up to 10 kilos of the drug were seized during the raid on a house in Swords, Co Dublin.

Officers from the National Bureau of Criminal Investigation and the National Drug Unit were involved in the operation. A man arrested at the scene is being detained under Section 2 of the Drug Trafficking Act at Balbriggan Garda station.

Paraphernalia including an industrial compressor, trowels, blenders, plastic bags and mixing agent were also recovered.

The operation was based in a house which was for sale in Ballyboughal. The house remained sealed off last night while it was forensically examined.

In 2004, cocaine with an estimated value of EUR1.3million was uncovered at a flat in nearby Donabate.

Following that raid gardai uncovered hydraulic compressor, chemical mixers, mixing agents and household liquidisers. Cocaine is most commonly mixed with lactose, glucose, mannitol and caffeine.

Gardai estimate that up to E210 million in cocaine was sold in 2005.

Tests performed by the Forensic Science Laboratory on a range of street drugs seized by Gardai over the past number of years have found that many are being mixed with pharmaceutical drugs in dangerous combinations.

Some contained phenacetin, a painkiller that was taken off the market in some countries because of links with kidney failure.

Tests also showed the extent to which drug dealers diluted drugs. Some cocaine and amphetamine samples had only eight per cent cocaine and 1 per cent amphetamine.

[e-mail]