It is in the Quebec region where the Sûreté du Québec seized the largest quantity of crystal meth last year, even far surpassing the raids in the Montreal region.
• Also read: More and more overdoses linked to crystal meth in Quebec
According to data obtained by The Journal with the Sûreté du Québec (SQ), it is here that the police carried out the most significant raids in 2024, getting their hands on more than 63 kilos of methamphetamine in the form of crystals, i.e. crystal meth.
This is the largest quantity of crystal meth seized by the SQ in one year for one region, since 2022. Remember that last October, the authorities discovered no less than 15 kilos of this drug in a warehouse on Watt Avenue, in Sainte-Foy.
In total, the police made 34 seizures in the region, compared to 11 in Montreal, where they got their hands on just under a kilo last year (see table below).
Last October, The Journal reported that this drug, which had recently arrived on the Quebec market, had become one of the most popular among consumers and was causing significant damage.
Although data for last year is not yet available, police officers from the Quebec City Police Service (SPVQ) also recently experienced an increase in the quantities seized of this drug between 2022 and 2023, going from 41 grams to just over a kilo the following year.
According to criminologist Maria Mourani, it is not “abnormal” to find a large quantity of crystal metha drug sold largely by street gangs. “This is because police operations have targeted very specific street gangs over the last year,” she explains.
Maria Mourani, criminologist
Photo BEN PELOSSE
Made in Mexico
This drug, very present in large centers such as Quebec and Montreal, is mainly imported from Mexico, recognized as a major producer of methamphetamine “of good quality, at low price and made in very large quantities”, according to Rosalie Dion, strategic analyst. in criminal intelligence at the SQ.
“Since the increase in crystal meth in Quebec and Canada, we have started to see a drop in local production in favor of crystal meth which is imported [du Mexique]. […] This is what we find in the United States and which seems to have spilled over into Canada and Quebec,” she says.
Different “entry doors” would then allow its importation into our country, including the dark web.
“Online purchases are something that we are starting to find more and more in the narcotics market,” explains M.me Dion.
The dismantling of clandestine laboratories manufacturing this type of drug would “not be that common,” estimates Pascal Roy, organized crime investigator at the Sûreté du Québec.
As proof, the last significant dismantling dates back to April 2015, in Saint-Césaire, in Montérégie, where more than 18 kilos of crystal meth had among other things been seized.
-The last dismantling of a clandestine “crystal meth” laboratory was carried out in April 2015, in Saint-Césaire, in the Montérégie region. We see here several containers of highly chemical and dangerous products, used in the manufacture of methamphetamine.
Photo provided by the Sûreté du Québec
A sign that the “local production” of this drug is being neglected, the “encapsulation sites”, which are used in particular for the creation of drug tablets, are however increasingly present, underlines the investigator. In these often unsanitary places and regularly dismantled by the authorities, we find more and more methamphetamine in the form of crystals, adds Mr. Roy.
The Sûreté du Québec reports finding more and more methamphetamine in the form of crystals, called “crystal meth,” in large centers like Quebec and Montreal in recent years.
Photo provided by the Sûreté du Québec
“By importing a finished product from outside, you save yourself costs and risks, that’s the hypothesis we have, with the data we have at hand,” he explains.
– With the collaboration of Charles Mathieu
Seizures of crystal meth by the Sûreté du Québec in 2024
Capitale-Nationale
- Number of seizures: 34
- Total quantity seized: 63.2 kilos
- Total seized since 2022: 109.38 kilos
Montérégie
- Number of seizures: 42
- Total quantity seized: 2.5 kilos
- Total seized since 2022: 47.9 kilos
Montréal
- Number of seizures: 11
- Total quantity seized: 0.95 kilo
- Total seized since 2022: 181.3 kilos
Abitibi-Témiscamingue
- Number of seizures: 50
- Total quantity seized: 0.75 kilo
- Total seized since 2022: 2.32 kilos
Laurentians
- Number of entries: 10
- Total quantity seized: 0.22 kilo
- Total seized since 2022: 464.7 kilos
Chaudière-Appalaches
- Number of seizures: 21
- Total quantity seized: 0.21 kilo
- Total seized since 2022: 0.86 kilo
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