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News of high school-aged dial-a-dopers, human trafficking and a looming gang turf war highlighted a presentation made to media by the head of the Edmonton Police Service's Co-ordinated Crime Unit.

About 30 news personnel were given an inside look at police efforts to combat organised crime in the capital region during a sometimes graphic image-filled presentation made by EPS Staff Sgt. Kevin Galvin, a 21-year veteran of the force.

Some of the details revealed by Galvin were not to be made public, part of a police trust-building effort to engage media in a frank dissection of a problem that affects all those living through Alberta's current prosperous time.

Galvin stated the province was the home of two dozen organised crime groups who have found enough room in an illicit economy to co-exist and co-operate peacefully.

Speaking to the large number of gangs Galvin said, "It's at the highest number we've ever seen and its tied directly to the lucrative economy."

The operating truce is a sharp contrast to events in British Columbia's lower mainland that has seen 18 dead this year in gang and drug-related killings.

Using parallels from the business world, Galvin illustrated the structured nature of the drug trade in Edmonton. With product delivered casually pizza-style by high school gang-wannabes and lavish parties feted on successful partners at downtown penthouses and mountain retreats, Galvin cautioned the good times of Edmonton's criminal enterprises may soon come to an end.

"There's a group of young people who get involved with a business process that they think is the MTV lifestyle and they are not prepared for the violent end of it," Galvin warned. "And when it occurs they don't know how to get out."

Much of the focus of the presention was on dial-a-dopers, young teens recruited with the promise of fast money and good times.

"Sex, drugs and rock and roll," is the lure according to Galvin.

Operating out of stash houses owned by ordinary citizens acting as absentee landlords (referred to by Galvin as "passive facilitators"), the foot-soldiers of the drug trade are bound by rules of conduct not unlike those found posted in the lunch rooms of fast-food outlets.

The four-wheeled drug runners must deliver their product to buyers (known as "custys") within 20 minutes of a call made to their disposable cellphones, with the time on the phones to be "maxed out" before they are discarded. Workers must be awake for an hour before reporting to posted 8-hour shifts, with a stern warning that no sampling of product or partying is to take place until after their shift is over.

Also forbidden is the involvement of girlfriends, and that the name of a "boss" is never to be mentioned. But the reward is hundreds of dollars for a single night's work – in cash and tax-free.

Galvin stated the dial-a-doper technique was spawned in Edmonton and has spread across Canada and the U.S. The Alberta capital also saw the first use of fortified drug houses as set up by Asian gangs in the mid-1990s. Such houses have been all but eradicated locally by aggressive enforcement, but they have spread to south of the border.

The product of choice for home delivery in Edmonton is cocaine. Galvin cited instances of local operations turning a 25 to 35-thousand dollar per kilo investment of the drug into a $125,000 profit over the course of a weekend. Much of the contraband is fronted to sellers on credit.

When business is good and the cashflow is steady, things run smoothly.

"While the money is good there will be higher levels of tolerance between gangs and gang conduct and gang relationships," Galvin told reporters.

But should dial-a-dopers come up short at the end of a shift, a "piping" is usually in order. Punishments for more serious infractions are sublet to gangs that specialise in enforcement, with the morning news then reporting non-lethal shootings and stabbings in bars, homes and on the street.

And sometimes bad business practices or non-sanctioned entrepreneurship leads to homicide.

Galvin divided the city's murder record into thirds: intimate (occurring between persons usually known to each on personal terms), secondary (a by-product of robbery or assault), with the remaining fraction related to maintaining an intimidating code of criminal conduct and respect.

When business is bad and the cashflow is interrupted, things become problematic.

The recent spate of violence in Vancouver has been attributed to a downturn in that area's drug trade, and according to Galvin that has resulted in markers being called in with fatal results.

Suggesting that it's a matter of not if but when, Galvin pointed to British Columbia gangs eyeing the Alberta market, bringing with them their methods and practices. Given the now expanding and co-operative nature of criminal enterprises locally, affiliations with at least three west coast gangs have already been struck.

"Some of the criminal business relationships that exist with people in British Columbia also exist with some of our people here. And there may be a ripple effect," Galvin warned.

Galvin suggested organised elements from central and eastern Canada are now also Alberta bound.

"The relationship between our criminal networks and gangs are already solidified not only in British Columbia but across this nation."

To illustrate that co-operation is actively on the ground, Galvin cited a recent vehicle stop that yielded several illegal weapons. The three occupants of the car were all from different criminal groups.

"We would not have seen those groups working together like that 18 months ago. But they can make money. The bulk of the motive for criminal enterprise is money," Galvin said.

The amount of money is staggering. The Canada Revenue Agency reports that between 22 and 55 billion dollars annually is lost to criminal activity. And while the drug trade is a large part of that loss, property crimes and prostitution are also major components of the total figure.

Theft from local construction sites is large scale, involving not just pallets of lumber but semi-trailers full of goods. To store, re-sell and financially manage the material requires a high level of sophistication that only organised criminals are capable of.

Galvin pointed out that it is opportunity that provides motive. While drugs and goods have long been stock in trade for Alberta gangs, the now easy access to teenaged girls via social network internet sites has led one Alberta gang to become a major player in international prostitution.

According to Galvin, such girls realise by the fourth date their newly-found online "friend" is not so great – especially when he brings her to a hotel room filled with eight men. By the time they are done with her she can never go back to her family. She is soon paired with experienced girls in other cities and groomed for a market that pays $10,000 for a weekend that can be booked online in advance.

"They're being groomed at the 17 and 18-year-old mark and probably working by 19. These are women that would genuinely startle you if you knew," Galvin said.

Edmonton police are currently working with authorities in Las Vegas, with one recent case involving an Alberta girl found in the Nevada desert dead.

In terms of measurable enforcement, the metro Edmonton gang unit seized 46 kilograms of cocaine in 2006. According to Galvin's estimates, that represents only about one per cent of the product that moves through the city annually.

Galvin supports an approach that starts at the bottom and faults a bail system he thinks is "failing your community."

"I want to see the right people held in pre-trial custody. Not the one-timers, but architects of huge safety issues in your community," Galvin said. "If you tracked car thieves, mostly young offenders, you'd be appalled at the release conditions. They're all getting out."

Bail hearings are held before justices of the peace, often practicising defence lawyers who act compelled to grant freedom to those brought before them. A recent change proposed by Premier Ed Stelmach would have Crown prosecutors, not the police, make the case for the pre-trial custody of offenders.

Galvin would also like to see a gang-diversion program similar to the ones already available for drug users, suggesting such intervention would stem the flow of frontline workers to the drug trade.

Near the end of the presentation held at the Southeast Division Edmonton police station, Galvin caught himself and suggested he didn't want the situation to seem hopeless.

"This is a very small percentage of our community that gets involved with this stuff. You're not going to wake up and find the city's burned to the ground."

However, that offering of optimism was countered by criminologist Bill Pitt, now teaching at MacEwan College. Responding to Galvin's suggestion of a ripple effect coming from Pacific coast gang activities, Pitt envisioned a greater change to the local criminal climate.

"I don't think it is going to be a ripple effect. I think it's going to be a full-blown tsunami," Pitt told CTV and CBC Edmonton reporters.

Echoing Galvin's business analogies, Pitt expanded.

"The infrastructure's already in place here. It's just a matter of bringing in the real board room types."

"It's not a matter of if it's coming ... it's when it's coming ... 'cause it's on its way."

As of November 7th, 26 murders had been committed in Edmonton in 2007. Only two have been positively identified as being drug and/or gang related, while such links in three other cases have not been completely ruled out.

On February 20th the body of David Wong was found while it was being dismembered in a Boardwalk Centre apartment. Four men were each charged with one count of accessory to murder and one count of offering an indignity to a body. No murder charges have been laid.

On May 6th Ola Tinineh Moses was gunned down inside the Urban Stylez clothing store. Two men were charged with kidnapping and other offenses but no one has been charged with his death.

Both Wong and Moses' murders have been confirmed as having gang and drug links.

On May 15th the Delwood Double Murder (Deng Atem Bulgak and Juk (Jock) Deng Ring) took place in the backyard of Bulgak's home. Both men were shot to death and the case remains open and active.

On September 4th James Douglas Foley was found stabbed to death in his car while he was parked in the Clarke Park parking lot. Foley's case also remains open and active.

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edmonton, alberta – the murder capital of canada