A Web sitebased in Amsterdam that says it sold marijuana and hashish to clients in 15 countries has been shut down by Dutch police. Prosecutors are reportedly investigating the site, apparently the first on the Net that actually took orders for widely illegal drugs and delivered them to customers.
Organizers of Neuroroom, hosted on the server XS4ALL in Amsterdam, said they had done a brisk business since the site went up in March 1996. Neuroroom activists, interviewed anonymously by email, said they filled more than 500 orders for "soft drugs" - hashish and marijuana. Users of the service responded with "donations." Site activists said they sent the drugs via snailmail to the United States and Canada as well as to countries in Europe.
"A visitor to our site asks us to buy some weed at a coffee shop, to put the weed into an envelope and send it to their home," one of three founders of the site told Wired News. "Concerning [sending] soft drugs in the mail, we don't know if it's really illegal."
In the Netherlands, a limited amount of marijuana and hashish can be bought in designated areas. The country also has strict laws regarding confiscation and opening of mail. The sellers said they had a 90 percent success rate in sending small amounts of marijuana and hashish through the post.
"You email your name and address and how you will pay. When the amount is paid we do send the client's order by post: simple," a seller said.
Last week, XS4all was asked by the Amsterdam police to shut down the site. The police had received requests from other countries to shut the site down. Neuroroom's staff could face up to six years in prison if convicted on charges of trafficking narcotics.
"When the police confronted me with the site, I was asked to put it offline. Otherwise I would become an accomplice in the case, and risk prison sentence as well," XS4all director Felipe Rodriquez said in an email. "I was quite surprised that someone was using a Web page to sell marijuana and other drugs, and closed the Web site down."
The site was started to "research free speech, free trade, and free use of" the Internet, to "question Dutch national soft-drug policy in relation to info-networks in a international context," and to "wake up the world wasting money on the drug war," a seller said in an email.
In addition to its "soft-drug" products, Neuroroom was also marketing the drug Ecstasy and offering access to an online lottery.
Neuroroom's founders said they plan on reopening on the Net once they are "tuned on the law experiences we have right now."
