Operation Julie

Operation Julie was a UK police investigation into the production of LSD by two drug rings during the mid-1970s. The operation, involving 11 police forces over a 2½-year period, resulted in the break-up of one of the largest LSD manufacturing operations in the world. It culminated in 1977 with enough LSD to make 6.5 million ‘tabs’ with a then street value of £100m (equivalent to £560 million today) being seized, 120 people arrested in the UK and France and over £800,000 discovered in Swiss bank accounts.

The two LSD rings broken up by Operation Julie had begun life as one organisation. Its founders were David Solomon, an author, and Richard Kemp, a chemist, who first successfully synthesized LSD in 1969.

Unable to effectively distribute the LSD they had made, they turned to Henry Todd to handle sales. At this point the organisation was based in Cambridge. Later Todd enrolled Leaf Fielding as a tabletter, responsible for turning the raw material into accurately measured doses.

In 1973, the producers had a bust-up with the distributors and production ceased for a time. Kemp and Solomon set about organising another distribution network and recommenced LSD production in west Wales. Todd recruited a chemist, Andy Munro, to synthesise LSD for his distribution network at a laboratory they set up in Hampton Wick, Greater London. There were now two separate functioning organisations.

In 1975, Todd and Fielding changed roles. Todd took over the tabletting, Fielding ran the distribution network, supplying Russell Spencely who in turn supplied Alston Hughes (known as 'Smiles'). From Hughes, the LSD was distributed to a number of wholesale dealers in Wales and Birmingham.

In April 1975, Kemp’s red Range Rover was involved in a fatal accident with a car near Machynlleth, a passenger in the other car being killed. Kemp was known to Detective Inspector Dick Lee of the Thames Valley Drug Squad as a possible suspect in the drugs trade and when police searched his car they found six pieces of paper which, after being reconstructed, spelt hydrazine hydrate - a key ingredient in the manufacture of LSD. This crucial lead gave police their first vital clue into the drug ring operating in west Wales.

The discovery in Kemp’s car prompted the establishment of Britain's first combined drug busting operation led by Dick Lee of the Thames Valley Drug Squad. On 17 February 1976, a meeting at Brecon involving a number of chief constables and senior drug squad officers formed a multiforce operation. This was the beginning of Operation Julie.

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