Police seize 2m Nipam pills<\/p>\n
JAKARTA (JP): Police seized more than two million Nipam 10
\npills, barbiturate-type drugs whose sale and production is
\nprohibited, in a raid on a drug packaging factory in West
\nJakarta, the City Police spokesman said yesterday.<\/p>\n
Lt. Col. E. Aritonang said a team of police detectives raided
\na two-story house at Taman Kota Bloc C3\/3. Kebon Jeruk, Thursday
\nmorning and arrested 21 employees.<\/p>\n
Police also confiscated machinery and equipment including two
\npressing machines, 11 tablet molds, two cutting machines and a
\ngray Kijang van registration number B 1107 TM, Aritonang said
\nlast night.<\/p>\n
\"The police are looking for factory's supplier, identified as
\nA Cek alias A Kiong. He is the main suspect as he also runs the
\nfactory,\" he said, adding that 485,000 of the seized pills were
\npacked and ready for sale.<\/p>\n
The government banned the production and sale of Nipam 10 in
\nthe 1980s. Since then the pills have been popular with drug users
\nhere.<\/p>\n
Nipam is usually sold in a strip of 10 pills for around Rp
\n2,500.<\/p>\n
Aritonang said the raid at A Kiong's rented house was not easy
\nbecause it was always locked from the inside. Police had closely
\nwatched the house since Wednesday before conducting the raid at
\n9:00 a.m. Thursday, he said.<\/p>\n
\"Except for the supervisor, A Tet, 60, and the driver, no one
\nwas allowed to leave the house. They worked, ate and slept in
\nthat house,\" he said.<\/p>\n
Almost all the employees, aged from 12 years old to 60 years
\nold, claimed they had worked at the factory for only three to
\nfive days before Thursday's raid. They also said they were taken
\nto the factory by middle-men.<\/p>\n
A Tet, claiming he had worked for only three days prior to the
\nbust, said he and the other employees packed at least 14,000
\nstrips a day.<\/p>\n
A Tet, now at police detention center for questioning, told
\njournalists yesterday that A Kiong had offered him the job at the
\nfactory.<\/p>\n
\"I took the tablets from A Kiong's house near the Pluit Mega
\nMall every morning, to the factory to be packed in the plastic
\nstrips. At night, I took the ready for sale drugs back to Pluit,\"
\nA Tet said.<\/p>\n
The youngest employee, Lem, 12, said he and his three friends
\nwere offered the job by a middleman who promised them work in a
\nplastics factory for a daily wage of Rp 6,000.<\/p>\n
All 21 employees are now at City Police's detention center.
\n(04)<\/p>",
"url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/police-seize-2m-nipam-pills-1447893297",
"image": ""
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