OPERATION JULIE
During the early Seventies the world saw a seemingly inexhaustable supply of high quality LSD. The vast majority of this LSD was made in Britain by two chemists, Richard Kemp and Andy Munro who in turn were part of a large distribution and marketing network. The police initiative to tackle this huge influx of LSD was called Operation Julie and the term has come to encompass both the LSD manufacture and distribution as well as the police investigation. These pages (see sub menu, below left) will attempt to collate and reproduce the key feature articles and news cuttings, along with other Operation Julie information. If you have any information about the people involved with Operation Julie, or have written or photographic materials relevant to the events, please get in touch via the Contact Form.
The Operation Julie pages on this site give additional and new information about the events. For a broader understanding of the background to Operation Julie it it is essential that the interested reader consult the few available books and other media sources about it. Most are written either partially or totally from the establishment point of view. It seems that none of those involved in the LSD manhufacturing and distribution conspiracy intend to write a book about it and until that happens we are left with an incomplete history.
Operation Julie by Dick Lee and Colin Pratt (WH. Allen, London, 1978)
This was somewhat hastily knocked out in the wake of the 1978 Operation Julie trial. Lee is of course The Detective Chief Inspector who was behind the Operation Julie investigations and arrests. Pratt was a journalist on the Daily Express.
Comment: An essential book but written very much from the police point of view. However, it is essential reading.
It's out of print at the moment but copies can be located on Amazon and Abebooks, usually at around £150 each.
The Brotherhood of Eternal Love by Stewart Tendler and David May (Cyan Books, 2007)
An interesting book, which covers Operation Julie well and embeds it firmly as being a part of a global LSD conspiracy initiated by The Brotherhood of Eternal Love. I'm not sure I buy into conspiracy at this level and the evidence to support it is sometimes flimsy. Tendler was The Times' crime writer who covered the 1978 Julie trials. May has links to the counterculture. The original 1984 Panther edition of this book is rare as hens teeth!
In print
Acid: A New Secret History of LSD by David Black (Vision, 2001)
Black also covers Operation Julie and dwells extensively on the more murky, para-political aspects opf the case. Thus, Ron Stark gets good coverage and organised crime is dragged into the melting pot. Whether or not Black's join-the-dots acid history is any more or less true than anyone elses is open to conjecture. Still essential reading though.
In print
Busted! by Martin Pritchard and Ed Laxton (Mirror Books, 1978)
Another book that was rushed into print after the 1978 Operation Julie trials. Pritchard was an undercover cop on Julie and other drug investigations, Laxton the obligatory journo ghost writer. And what a hoot this book is; the writing is deathless, breathless and most of the time, useless. It's written in a style which reminds me of how they spoke in The Sweeney and comes from a headspace where cops were very much men and the villains were dirty disgusting pinko-commie subversives. That said, and if read with a pinch of salt and a sprig of garlic, it gives an interesting insight into the police infiltration of free festivals and dealer networks of the mid Seventies.
Out of print. Copies often appear on Amazon and Abebooks at around the £25 mark.
Albion Dreaming by Andy Roberts Marshall Cavendish, London, 2008
Chapter 11, The Mind Alchemists, deals with Operation Julie but more from the conspirators point of view than the establishment's.
Operation Julie by Lyn Ebenezer (Y Lolfa, 2008)
This book is a Welsh language book and as I don't speak Welsh I am unable to make much comment on it. Lyn Ebenezer was a Welsh journalist who covered the case for local newspapers. This slim tome (102 pages) tells the story from his point of view. I hope to get it translated soon, after which I'll comment more.
Currently in print