Lining your pockets
CHRIS KAY investigates the reality behind student drug dealers and discovers that profits can often go up in a puff of smoke
Many students often view drugs as a classic ingredient to their university experience, albeit a generally more secretive one compared to going to lectures and scrolling through dusty textbooks in the library. It is an undeniable fact that a large portion of the student population has indulged in illicit substances at least a few times or knows someone who has.
For some students drug taking is synonymous with leisure and is an integral part of going out or even staying in. For many it is an occasional indulgence, for others, a way of life. It is those who regularly entertain their habits that often find that their student loan disappears as quickly as a certain white powder goes up a nostril. In such cases some turn to dealing to other eager students as a way of supplementing their habit and making money.
Universities provide an ideal atmosphere for dealers to operate in. One first year student, who sells marijuana and MDMA (Ecstasy), told The Courier, “there is such a big market for it really, especially among students.” Like many student dealers he started supplying others to supplement his own drug use.
He says: “Before I came to university I started off just smoking weed and I just wanted a cheaper way to do it. Most of my mates did it so I bought it in bulk and sold it on, and I saw that there was money to be made.”
He admits that while most student dealers will probably end up using the money made to support their vice, it is possible to “make a good bit of profit if you don’t take most of it yourself.”
With regards to how much can be made he says: “It depends on the type of weed, but you can get an ounce from anything between £100-£150, so if you bought it at £100-£120 you will sell it on for about £160, and if you bought it for £140-150 you will sell it on for £200+. If you are buying an ounce then generally you will be making £50 profit minimal, and if you buy bigger than that you usually make a few hundred profit.”
With MDMA he speculates that you can make “a stupid amount of profit”. He says: “If you buy about £100 worth you can sell that on for £150 straight away, and that’s a very small amount to be buying it for as a dealer, after that it gets ridiculous.”
What is problematic, he claims, is that students who deal are usually on the lower levels of a “massive chain of people” through which the drugs have to travel through from their original source. The most stressful aspect for him is that “you are always waiting on someone else, who is themselves waiting on another person”. He also adds that customers can also be a problem when they ask for the substances on credit.
“I know dealers who will allow people stuff on credit, and I have known people who have robbed £200 worth of drugs off dealers and then just disappear. I don’t do that, if they want that much then I would want the money up front.”
While he claims to only deal occasionally when he either needs some money or drugs for himself, he says that in terms of time and money made “it saves getting a job”. He adds: “I would rather keep occasionally dealing, but I guess it is more ethical to get a job. Plus if you don’t have a job and money is just coming into your bank that is when you can get into trouble with the police, but most people who deal loads will have at least a part time job.”
However for the majority of student dealers it seems that profit is not the end result, and very few seem to be able to do it so that they can bankroll their way through university. The Courier spoke to a third year student, who didn’t view himself as a proper dealer, but did admit that he used to sell on large amounts of marijuana to his friends. He concedes that it could have been a lucrative enterprise had it not been for the fact that he always “smoked away the profit.”
In his words: “I just ended up on really good terms with the person who sorted me out. Once a week I would go along with £300 worth of business at the best of it, and I would get all the weed for my friends. I basically bought for myself and then sold on what was left, and I probably managed to save about £40 a week between me and my flatmates.”
He laughs when asked if it put a strain on his studying or other parts of his life. “No it was ace! If you took out the fact that I was getting weed for myself, I could have been making about £60 for one hour of work. If I had the demand to do that two or three times a week I would have been sorted.”
The problem, he claims, is that most students that get into supplying weed usually end up smoking the money making excess. He does add that there are exceptions to the rules.
“I do know one guy who didn’t smoke at all, got into dealing and he used to make about £60 a week, which would probably come from him selling on two ounces. If you get serious you can make a lot of money, but you need a car. One guy I know must have a deal with a local taxi company because he always turns up in a taxi within five minutes of you calling him, so I can’t imagine he is paying for all those taxis!”
As such examples show there are certain exceptions where some students can use it as a more lucrative and time saving method of supplementing their meagre loan rather than getting a traditionally legitimate part time student job. Despite all the dangers, and potential expulsion from university, he recounts that one student he knew managed to make £1500 in his first year dealing marijuana from his hall of residence. “He always bragged about it”, he adds.
Overall he believes that if students do decide to deal drugs, it is usually soft ones such as weed. He says that he does not know of any student who sells anything harder than weed and that he personally believes that the criminal risk of supplying more lucrative drugs is “just not worth it”.
He says: “If you get caught dealing weed I get the impression if it’s about three to four ounces then you just get a slap on the wrist, you can just say with that amount that you’re a massive stoner!”
He decides to put in context, saying: “I know a guy who got stopped on the way into a club, and he was really stupid because he had about two ounces of weed and £300 quid in his bag and he pretty much got away with it, he just got barred from the club. But another one of my mates got caught with about 15 pills on him and he got sent to the police. It’s just not worth it. If you set up a decent enough operation with safe houses and stuff then I’m sure you can make an absolute killing, but that is when it does seriously encroach on you being a student.”
In a freedom of information request sent to Northumbria Police The Courier found that out of the 93 ‘higher education’ students arrested for possession of drugs, between September 2007 to April 9th of this year, only one was arrested for intent to supply. While this academic year is still not over, these figures are not extremely different from the figures dating the previous academic year, when 147 were arrested for possession and four for intent to supply.
However, Northumbria Police did admit that the figures for university student arrests may be even smaller still as the figure quoted included those who were above the age of 16 who stated they were students, but could simply be in college or sixth forms. Overall it can be easy to speculate that only a small faction of university students in the North East who take or supply drugs are ever caught.
Compared to other part time jobs, dealing drugs seems to inevitably full of pit falls. If the statistics are anything to go by it may not be the hash induced paranoia of the police that will suddenly dent your illicit entrepreneurial skills, but rather the taste of the supplied vice is often too tempting to leave untouched.
By Chris Kay
Revision Bites
HANNAH BURNS chews over the issue of how stress affects the way we eat, and takes a light-hearted look at the bizarre habits some of us adopt
There are several species of Food Fad Fauna that can be seen haunting the library during every exam period, each working in different ways, each having a different relationship with food. I have named them each as the Nocturnal Caffeine Junky, the Constant Nibbler, the Tea Breaker, the Brain Fuel Feeder and the Stressed Forgetful Faster.
Most people adopt a selection of these food fads at any one time and it may be the natural way to deal with the pressures of exams. But they aren’t healthy and certainly don’t help you gain good marks. Not eating whilst revising can be far worse for you and your results than eating to excess (although bikini pictures on a post-exam holiday may not agree.) so it is important to remember to maintain regular meals made up of energy and nutrient filled foods. 
Not relying on the sugary snacks and caffeine that give an initial high but are followed quickly by a slump can be difficult. But there are hundreds of meals that can be prepared quickly and cheaply that don’t come pre-made from a supermarket. The key is to be prepared, perhaps by freezing meals made in advance or making sure that your cupboards are well stocked, so you don’t have to resort to making a meal out of a mushroom and a tin of peach slices.
If like me you are inclined to snack excessively and dislike the fact that you do this, and are too distracted to work when you don’t, there are tips and tricks to stop the calorie count escalating. Remember it takes just a single chocolate bar a day too much to gain a couple of pounds over a standard revision period.
The Nocturnal Caffeine Junky:
Fuelled throughout the revision period in its entirety with coffee and cola, the NCJ swears by their method and once inducted is cursed as an NCJ for life. You can tell you are in the presence of an NCJ just by looking at them. Most commonly found with coffee in hand in the wee hours of the morning, other give-away signs include blood-shot eyes, a noticeable tremor and excessive jumpiness. They also can be found sprinting desperately to the toilets, due to the pressure on their bladder from a fluid diet.
The Constant Nibbler:
Hamster like in their eating habits the Constant Nibbler will work continually whilst simultaneously snacking. Breaks feature less often in the CN revision period as all their snacks are pre-prepared just an arms length away.
Lifting hand to mouth becomes a repetitive motion, second nature: the CN may not even be aware they’re doing it until their supply runs out. Chocolate and crisps become the diet of the CN and regular meals tend to slowly disappear into obscurity.
The Tea Breaker:
The Tea Breaker adheres to the convention that one can only really learn for about 40 minutes at a time, scheduling their excessive number of breaks to fit this. Tea is common excuse for a time out and is carried out as a social affair, with many TB’s breaking together to meet and discuss revision progress.
Actual revision time can be constructive, until the final minutes are disrupted by planning the next break.
The Brain Fuel Feeder:
The Brain Fuel Feeder has read every text book related to optimum nutrition during the revision period. Not following their regular diet, the BFF cooks brain rich food such as fish and boiled vegetables, and spends extortionate amounts on vitamin tablets and herbal remedies ‘proven’ to promote neural growth.
BFFs become a bore to their friends, discussing in depth the many benefits of a twice daily dose of grapefruit extract. However, the BFF secretly suffers the embarrassment of excessive flatulence due to their new diet, though perhaps not as silently as they hope.
The Stressed Forgetful Faster:
Working hard leads to excess adrenaline in the SFF which means that regular meals are often forgotten, yet unlike the CN they aren’t replaced by excessive snacking. The SFF can be recognised as looking a little grey sitting in the corner of the library not having moved in the last 3 days. And despite a handy weight loss, lack of food and water means the SFF struggles towards the end of the long revision period and may become delirious on exam day.
Top Revision Tit Bits
1. The humble banana was seemingly created entirely for the purpose. Perfect revision fuel, pre-wrapped and perfect on its own or cut up in cereal or yoghurt or mashed over toast and honey. Its slow release energy lasts a long time
2. Nuts, seeds and dry fruits- small and fiddly meaning you can pick at them for hours on end without actually eating much. Filled chock-a-block with essential fatty acids helping a hopefully growing brain
3. Frozen fruits – for me these are best on the warm days, they are good to munch on and full of natural sugars and energy. My favourites are frozen summer fruits which can be bought in any supermarket or grapes I freeze myself.
4. Small cubes of dark chocolate- iron rich and brain fuel, they are perfect for a much needed chocolate fix.
5. Anything cut into very small pieces, from a carrot to a mars bar. The small portions help with snacking and mean a similar portion will last longer.
