THE DOPE EVIL

Hokitika Guardian, 12 July 1926, Page 1

THE DOPE EVIL

LIFE’S TRAGEDIES. SYDNEY, July 1. People hear little or nothing about tho dope traffic, because there is nothing showy or spectacular about it like the drink traffic, for instance. If, for example, a man gets drunk, becomes .somewhat bellicose and disagreeable, and punches the first policeman he meets or passes uncomplimentary remarks about him—intoxicated persons do sometimes do things like that—one knows precisely where to find him. In the Ploice Court, of course. The drug addict, on the contrary, is never beard of. Demoralised, a physical wreck, he just drifts out of sight. POIGNANT DRAMAS. There is no more poignant drama that the story of some of the hopeless addicts in and about Sydney. The Rev. R. B. S. Hammond, one of tho leaders of the Prohibition forces in New South AVales, took one of these addicts under liis own roof and cared for him for nine months to try to redeem him. The man’s arms- were punctured all over as a result of injections. The last that Air Hammond hoard of the man, after he had met with an accident, was that he was in Queensland: Air Hammond, who for many years was active in trying to stem the tide of the traffic, knew of another man whose passion in life was chloroform. To get a hit of it on a handkerchief, sniff it up the nostrils like snuff, and then dose off to sleep and forgetfulness was the summit of his happiness. There is the authentic story also, in other quarters. of a young medical student whose leg was so riddled with injections of dope that it was feared that the limb would have to be amputated. He finished up in gaol. In their extremity, hopeless addicts have gone even to the Customs Department to try to get orders on chemists for one or other of the drugs. That the police are practically powerless under the present law to bring illicit traffickers' to book may sound extraordinary, but it is a fact. A Bill founded on the English law lias been on the stocks since" 1923, but it was opposed, it is understood, because of the restrictions that it placed on the legitimate traders in danger out; drugs. Tho police will be quite satisfied with an amendment of tbe Police Offences Act.