What NOT to do about a meth lab in your block

This post was inspired by a friend who said he’d been living happily in this flat in central Sydney for years and whose neighbour is, or was, a nice older man who kept himself to himself but always had a friendly smile if you met in the lift.

However, for the past few months he has been hanging out with younger guys who seem to be up to no good. The windows of his flat have all been covered with black plastic, there’s often loud music and there are strange chemical smells coming from the place.

Someone has suggested it might be a meth lab and he might be in danger either from an explosion or just from having drug dealers living and operating next door. The strata committee was aware but they didn’t seem to be able or motivated to do much.

The block has security cameras at the front door of the block, but none in the lift lobbies or lifts. What should he do?

Flat Chat called the NSW Police and asked the same question.They said the first thing you should if there is suspicious activity in your apartment block is call CrimeStoppers on 1800 333 000 or report this at NSW Crimestoppers.

“Information is treated in strict confidence,” they said, adding that you can report these things anonymously. “The public is reminded not to report information via NSW Police social media pages.”

One thing you really should not do is take matters into your own hands. For instance, putting up posters saying there are druggies in flat 150X, might lead to an immediate backlash against you or someone else in the building.

The same goes for confronting them in the lifts or corridors. It could also, conceivably, interfere with an ongoing police operation, which would be very counter-productive.

Should you ask your owners corporation (Body Corporate) to install security cameras on your floor? Well, perhaps but that is going to cost a lot of money because they would then have to do it on other floors.

An issue of privacy?

By the way, there are no privacy issues in the owners corp videoing right up to people’s apartment doors, provided there are signs warning any visiting tradies that they may be being filmed.

Seriously! It’s more of a workplace safety regulation than a privacy issue.

And that also brings us to the question of whether or not you get the strata committee and strata manager involved at all. You can bet they won’t want to be, but there are very sound reasons for keeping them out of it – at least officially.

With a very few exceptions, every piece of correspondence and documentation that passes through a strata committee must, by law, be made available for any owner to see.

So, if you send an email to your strata committee telling them that apartment 150X is a drug den, and you want something done about it, the miscreants won’t have to look too far to see who complained about them.

Not only that, your neighbours elsewhere in the building won’t be too pleased about the dent you have made in their property prices when prospective buyers see that come up in a strata search.

The best idea is to call CrimeStoppers and then have a quiet word with your building manager, strata manager or committee chair and let them know that you are anxious and that something needs to be done.

Then all you can do is let them do their jobs. It may well be that they are already aware of the problem and are talking to the police about it. But your approach will make it more personal and immediate.

Once the druggies realise they are being watched, they may move on anyway. And that’s when you put pressure on your owners corp to install cameras in the lifts, before there’s any problems in the future.

UPDATE: The day before this article was published on news.com.au, our friend reported a raid by six police who were seen carting away computers, files and anonymous cardboard boxes. All dubious activity has ceased.