This Is Exactly How Dealers Sell Drugs In Paceville
Anyone that’s spent time in Paceville over the last few years will probably have been approached by a drug dealer at some point or another.
Calling you as they sit on the pavements or whispering as they walk past you, the drug dealers that come into existence as soon as you make something illegal anywhere in the world have tried and tested methods of selling their wares – and the situation is no different for Malta.
A recent court case has shed some light on how one group of foreign dealers were able to go about their drug-dealing business in Paceville, even with police officers constantly patrolling the area.
Three Somali men arraigned in connection with drug charges explained to a Maltese court how they would maximise their profits while minimising risks for themselves as they sold drugs like cannabis and cocaine to partygoers in Paceville.
1. They split the drugs into small packages and hide them all over Paceville
The drugs are hidden in cracks and fissures among the more remote buildings and broken rocks throughout Paceville. Multiple members of a group of dealers will patrol the areas while carrying no drugs to make sure their hidden wares aren’t found.
2. And when a member of the group finds an interested buyer, they send a runner to pick up the goods
This messenger-of-sorts will go back to one of the fissures and grab some prepared packages of drugs, split up by weight and ready to be sold, and run back to the dealer and interested buyer.
Drugs are usually split into easily exchangeable packets, such as 1g of cannabis for 20 euros, to minimise transaction time.
3. If a dealer is caught, he will say it’s for personal use
Maltese law harshly punishes traffickers, so anyone caught with a large amount of a drug will most probably be punished. These dealers, who would rarely carry large amount of any drug on them, would play it off and say it was their personal stash if caught by the police with a gram or two.
4. If a police officer approaches a dealer, the dealer will drop the few packages he/she is carrying
Instead of carrying multiples bags of drugs on their person, the dealers would carry only a few packets, so as to be able to throw them away at a moment’s notice.
It is worth noting that the three Somali dealers who explained their methods to the court were young – they were in their 20s – and, of course, are among the lowest-level drug dealers on the island.
Tactics such as these are used only by drug mules and drug dealers that are just starting out – they are not used by drug kingpins, or indeed the serious drug dealers with reliable networks and a steady customer base.
With Maltese and tourists’ demand for drugs in places of entertainment becoming stronger and stronger, it seems likely that more drug dealers will be frequenting hotspots like Paceville, and finding new ways of getting away with selling drugs to people who are actively seeking to buy them.
What do you think of these methods?
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