Hydroponics equipment seized by police at drug busts could be destroyed almost immediately under new laws proposed by the State Government.

Equipment such as sodium lights, mercury vapour lights, reflectors and carbon filters are of little evidentiary use in court proceedings, but at present SA Police are only able to destroy the equipment at the end of court proceedings.

As a result, a large proportion of SAPOL’s evidence storage facility is dedicated to housing hydroponics equipment, more than half of which has been in storage for over a year.

Under these changes, destruction could be authorised once the illegal systems are uncovered, with guidelines to be developed between SAPOL and the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions regarding the destruction of equipment seized in relation to a major indictable offence.

SAPOL would be able to seek a court order to recover reasonable costs for the destruction following a successful conviction.

Quotes

Attributable to Kyam Maher

This is about getting tougher on illegal hydroponics growers, while ensuring police can better use their storage facilities to manage evidence that is genuinely needed for criminal proceedings.

In this instance, we’re talking about hydroponics equipment that is bulky, requires great effort and occupies an inordinate amount of storage space and can be presented before a court by other admissible means.

A key objective of this reform is to free up police resources, so that rather than seizing and sitting on pallets upon pallets of PHE, police can be out on the beat, fighting crime and protecting our community.

This Government will do everything it can to deliver improvements so that SAPOL can operate as a modern and efficient police force for South Australia.

This comes off the back of last year’s State Budget, in which our Government committed more than $12 million to an accelerated police recruitment course to hire 900 new police officers over three years and an additional 189 police security officers.