Operation “Lude Behavior” came to a close Wednesday as authorities announced 22 arrests that were made to dismantle a Nassau County-based national Quaalude trafficking operation. Quaalude, or Ludes for short, is a name for the drug methaqualone, which is classified as a sedative-hypnotic drug that is abused and was popularized in the 1960s. 
“Drugs are cyclical,” Nassau County District Attorney Kathleen Rice said, nodding to the recent reemergence of heroin on Long Island. Quaalude dealers and abusers aren’t the stereotypical drug dealers and drug addicts either, she said. “You can’t pigeonhole,” noting that the drugs were available to anyone who could afford the average street price of $35 per pill.
The investigation began in November 2007 when two Nassau County police officers arrested a man for petit larceny who then provided police with information on a drug dealer who sold Quaaludes. The tip led law enforcement through a nexus of Quaalude manufacture and distribution from Baldwin to Brooklyn to California.
“This is a case of good old fashioned police work,” Rice said.
The arrests ranged from street-level dealers all the way to the top of the operation, a Manhattan resident Dennis Patrick Fairley, 65. Fairley’s wife, Ana Sanchez of Baldwin and brother, Thomas Fairley of Modesta, California were also arrested along with an additional 19 individuals. Of the 22 arrested, 14 are Nassau County residents. All arrested have been charged with conspiring to distribute methaqualone and face a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison, and fines of $1 million or more if found guilty.
“Dennis Patrick Fairley’s alleged drug racket stretched literally from California to the New York Island,” said Preet Bharara, According to U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, which covers Manhattan, the Bronx and northern New York City suburbs. “Instead of applying his training as a chemist to advance science, he allegedly used it to concoct dangerous poisons and advance his personal wealth.”
Thirteen search warrants were executed in California, Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, Nassau, and Suffolk counties. Recovered from searches were tens of thousands of pills, finished and unfinished powders, unfilled pill capsules, a pill press machine, five cars, two guns and bank accounts containing more than $1 million were seized.
