The California Connection

As a joke, it drew great guffaws. "The biggest moneymaker in Hollywood last year was Colombia," quipped Johnny Carson during the 1981 Oscar awards ceremony. "Not the studio--the country." There is considerable truth in the jest: though used throughout the U.S., cocaine remains an especially apt symbol for the affluent Southern California lifestyle. If John De Lorean's alleged shipment of 220 lbs. had indeed made its way into the Los Angeles marketplace, it would have found buyers

easily enough. "That's not a great amount for this area," says Captain Robert Blanchard, commanding officer of the Los Angeles Police Department's narcotics division. "It would have been used up pretty

quickly." In Southern California, the customer can range from movie star to parking-lot attendant, from Orange County salesman to Beverly Hills housewife. For obvious reasons, the users in the entertainment industry win the most publicity, especially when something goes tragically wrong. Comedian John Belushi, who died at 33 last March of an overdose of cocaine and heroin, got the headlines. But the use of coke reaches into all cash-rich occupations.

"There is a Hollywood drug scene," says John Randell, director of a drug-abuse clinic for the wealthy in Century City. "But it is not just Hollywood. It is IBM and 3M. Wherever you find affluence, you'll find drug abuse." According to Randell, neither the recession nor the drug-related troubles of the famous have lessened the demand for coke. "The economy has had no effect," says Randell. "If anything, it makes using drugs more desirous, since people want to escape the pressure of the bad times." Incidents like the death of Belushi can have a perverse effect. Says Randell: "The more the fashionable people are arrested for doing

cocaine or the more who die from overdoses, the more other people are interested in trying it." The flow of cocaine into Southern California has risen dramatically in the past few years. Los Angeles police seized 356 lbs. of

cocaine in 1981, up from 183 in 1980. Why the increase? The primary reason, besides ever growing demand, is the opportunity for huge profits in a faltering economy. More

and more people, even professionals like lawyers and doctors, are dealing drugs. A kilo (2.2 lbs.) of uncut, nearly pure cocaine fresh from South America sells for about $60,000 wholesale in Los Angeles. An amount as large as De Lorean's alleged shipment would normally be purchased by a well-established drug dealer on behalf of a consortium of investors. From that initial buy, the coke can change hands several times, with the drug "cut" or adulterated each time until it is about 20% pure. On a Los Angeles street corner, a gram of coke sells for about $120. One gram can then be divvied up into about ten "lines" for sniffing. An infrequent user who might snort just a couple of lines at a party, compared to 20 lines a day for a heavy user, can buy by the quarter ($30) or half ($60) gram. The

original kilo, or "key," thus may end up fetching $500,000 on the street, for more than a 700% profit. For the adventurous, the greedy, or even for the hard-pressed businessman, the lure can become irresistible. "If you want to become a millionaire in a short period of time," says Robert Brosio, an assistant U.S. Attorney for Los Angeles, "in the drug business you can work your way up very fast." Fear of getting caught does not substantially deter risk taking. In Southern California, as elsewhere, those who use cocaine tend to be people of substance and reputation. "You're not dealing with dirt bags on the street," says Donald Bays, analytical

officer for the narcotics division of the Los Angeles police. "How are narcotics cops even going to penetrate a Beverly Hills place with security and gates and guard dogs?" The dealers are difficult to spot. Dressed in three-piece suits and carrying briefcases, the majority look like big businessmen, which they are. Says L.A. Attorney Robert Sheahen, who regularly represents coke dealers: "Most are sophisticated people who know the risks and try to protect themselves." But 28 new U.S. Attorneys and hundreds of federal agents are being thrown into the California drug war in coming months. There soon may be other unlikely suspects who get busted as John De Lorean did.

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