Posted on 09/25/2007 5:22:07 PM PDT by neverdem
Federal authorities said yesterday that they had exposed a sprawling underground distribution network for steroids, human growth hormone and other illicit bodybuilding drugs supplied by 37 companies in China.
The operation revealed a much wider, more diffuse commerce in performance-enhancing drugs than previously known, with a latticework of bathroom and basement manufacturers and distributors. That contrasted with the more centralized drug network from past years that tapped into established pharmaceutical pipelines.
A network of Internet-based chemical wholesalers, anonymous e-mail services and password-protected chat rooms fueled the trade, federal and state officials said.
“There is no kingpin here,” said Steve Robertson, a spokesman for the Drug Enforcement Administration in Washington. “We’re going after individual distribution cells. There’s no godfather of steroids.”
The D.E.A. estimates that 99 percent of the illegal steroids originate with chemicals from China. Most of the 124 who were arrested in the operation — including 50 over the past week — were charged with distributing chemicals bought in bulk from China, which as host of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing has been under pressure to deliver a drug-free Games. They are accused of setting up labs in their homes, notably on Long Island, to press them into pills or cook them into injectable liquids, the D.E.A. said.
Sales of the products, which are illegal to buy without a prescription and illegal to sell without a license from the D.E.A., were conducted with presumed anonymity on the Internet.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
They have time and money to go after bodybuilders but can’t enforce the immigration laws
complete horse poop. they want to go after people trying to look better and live a healthier lifestyle(notice breast implants are ok but steroids bad).
why dont they go after crack dealers or meth dealers or the dam border jumpers?
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