Five suspects including two women nabbed for selling drug-laced bottled drinks

Police have crippled a syndicate selling drug-laced bottled drinks with the arrest of five suspects, including two women, in Kepong and Gombak yesterday.

Bukit Aman Narcotics CID deputy director Datuk Mohd Dzuraidi Ibrahim said in an operation conducted on Tuesday from 8.45pm to 7am yesterday, the suspects, all locals, aged between 33 and 43, were nabbed in three separate raids.

Mohd Dzuraidi said in the first raid, the team from Bukit Aman Narcotics CID Department and Special Tactical and Intelligence Narcotics Group (Sting) arrested a man in Taman Beringin, Kepong here.

"Interrogation led to the arrest of four more suspects at condominiums in Gombak and Kepong. Police seized 1,218 bottles of drinks, which were 'flavoured' with Ketamine and Ecstasy, 10,015 ecstasy pills, 39 eramin pills, 108gm ketamine, all worth RM1.14 million in the operation," he told reporters at the Bukit Aman Police headquarters here.

He said initial investigations revealed that the syndicate had been operating in the condominiums for over six months and each bottle of the drug-laced drinks were sold at RM350 to visitors to the entertainment centre.

Mohd Dzuraidi said the suspects were being remanded for seven days from the date of arrest and the case investigated under Section 39B of the Dangerous Drugs Act 1952 which carries the mandatory death sentence upon conviction.

In another development, he said from Jan 1 to Oct 20, police had arrested 149,050 individuals, seized drugs worth RM215.58 million and seized property worth RM59.01 million.