01x02 - Episode 2

[bunniefuu]

TONNY KLUCK

FORMER DRUG DEALER

We were standing outside, on the street,

drinking coffee and smoking joints.

It was so quiet.

We weren't expecting any cops.

Then all of a sudden

[mimics g*n blasts]

We heard this hissing.

It was tear gas, coming from behind.

It was raining down over Pusher Street.

[person shouting]

[Kluck] And you know,

people got pretty angry.

[person shouts]

[Kluck] Then the cops came running.

They stampeded one or two people.

So everyone started looking

for every stone they could find.

Then the fighting started.

I don't know how to explain it.

Insanity.

[Larsen] What started

as an idealistic hippie dream,

ended in a brutal nightmare.

[The Wholesaler] If there's demand

for something and there's money to make,

people like me will swoop

in and capitalize.

[Larsen] On one side are the drug dealers,

on the other side,

you have the combat-ready cops.

When we strike, we follow through.

[people shouting]

[Larsen] And in the middle

are the Christianites.

SHAME

I felt like a hostage caught

between drug dealers and cops.

[man] What the hell are you doing?!

They wanted to hurt each other.

It was It was w*r.

We thought, "f*ck them."

In the situations, thinking,

"You're dead. You won't survive."

We got to the point

that we had always feared.

[g*n blast]

Someone was shot dead on Pusher Street.

That k*lling was the last straw in the

decades of fighting over Pusher Street.

g*ng w*r

PUSHER STREE

[contemplative music playing]

[Balther] Christiania had created

a restricted area,

where we basically told folks

JØRN BALTHER - DOCUMENTARY

FILMMAKER & CHRISTIANITE

"Here you can sell your hash,

and only hash can be sold.

You're not allowed to sell to children.

And we won't tolerate violence

or hard drugs."

But the most important rule

was you had to live in Christiania

two years to sell hash.

Which meant we knew each other.

And that way people could be held

fully accountable for their actions.

[Lykke] We accept weed as a drug.

However, we don't accept

all the repercussions

OLE LYKKE

CHRISTIANITE

that come from it being criminalized.

One of the most severe

consequences, of course,

was that the police essentially had

free rein to operate as they pleased.

We had enormous problems

with the police.

In the early 1990s,

Pusher Street was established

JESPER VESTERGAARD LARSEN

JOURNALIS

as the official marketplace

for hash in Christiania.

That makes the police's work much harder.

They need to get to the heart

of Christiania to get to the dealers.

And not only that, the first stalls that

the police encounter on Pusher Street

were those known as

The Front of the Line.

The dealers who worked

those stalls were the tough guys.

[man] Okay. Let's go.

When I was working in The Front

I was the one

who faced the problems from outside.

You had to deal with it.

[man] You g*dd*mn th*gs!

What the hell do you think you're doing!?

[people shouting]

I ended up at The Front.

I did that for almost 40 years.

[contemplative music playing]

In the beginning, it was for unity.

To be part of something.

And to be around people, I like that.

There was always someone you knew.

You could play ping-pong,

throw some darts,

have a few beers, smoke some weed.

There were always people

who wanted to do something.

I have lots of early childhood memories

of Pusher Street.

My mother worked in a cafe, making

open-faced sandwiches and breakfast.

MATILDE

CHRISTIANITE

The cafe was up in that middle

part of Pusher Street, called Woodstock.

It would turn into a bar in the afternoon.

In the morning, it was a gathering place

where everyone stops by.

So I have a lot

of great memories of Woodstock

and sitting there looking out

through the kitchen window

of the cafe onto Pusher Street

and the life that was happening.

There was a great sense of community

among all the people who hung out there.

[Lykke] Around 1991, 1992,

we had a swell of contributing forces.

We had a very positive influx

of all kinds of people,

like activists and folks

plying their creativity in things

like graffiti and hip-hop culture.

It's was abundantly clear to me

that hip-hop culture,

like many other youth cultures really,

uh, likes to smoke weed.

[bluesy rock music playing]

[Kluck] The general public was getting

more interested in weed at that time.

My customers preferred to unwind

in the evening with a joint

instead of a glass of wine,

which makes you belligerent.

It was a common commodity.

An everyday thing, for sure.

Christiania, from day one

had been fundamentally divided.

You've got the dealers and the activists,

that's the basic schism.

[man] I'm smoking with a buddy.

When one group is doing well,

generally the other probably is too.

They really went hand in hand

all throughout the nineties.

[Kluck] I didn't see it as ill*gal.

Everyone was good.

No one was forced to buy anything.

People came and asked for it.

[Lykke] What was really

going on, um, underneath,

was that interest was rising

in the ever-growing weed market,

because the number of weed smokers

in Denmark was growing.

[Norton] It's also during this period

that the Christiania community

starts to see cannabis arrive

more professionally.

CARSTEN NORTON

AUTHOR & JOURNALIS

The more professionalized sales continue

to become, the greater the demand is

for the individual stalls,

the dealers, and the kingpins.

So, in every way, the cannabis

trade really does start to take on

the character of any form of retail.

We always had a steady supply

of good, standard hash.

Our connections in Holland

were important men.

THE WHOLESALER

They were businessmen, who were

powerful in a number of sectors.

They owned hotels,

and lots of enormous companies.

But they had, to put it simply,

set up a wholesaler,

which traded in, cucumbers.

And they sold

to supermarkets in Denmark.

At one point,

their fleet was up to 28 trucks,

which they used

for the hauling of cannabis

around almost all of Europe.

28 TRUCKS WITH HASH

When I met with the truck driver

for the first time,

to make sure it was the right one,

because there were several,

I had to ask him the time.

His code word was "Rolex", so if he said

"Rolex", then it was the right driver.

We had to get a dozen pallets

out at a time

and then put them in the parking lot so we

could access the back wall of the trailer,

where the cannabis was hidden.

I remember standing there with all

these moving boxes and filling them up.

You would pack them just like if

you were moving out of your house.

"There's a little more room

over there on the left."

Then we drove home

with 1,600 kilos of hash from Ruddbyhow.

[tense music playing]

The final destination was Christiania.

We also had a stash house, a warehouse,

if you will, in, um, North Zealand.

We had this guy, he was actually

a janitor at a special school.

There was good access

down into his janitor supply room.

It was great because he even

had a pallet jack we could use.

He would, uh

He took all the other stuff that came

for the school, Like paper goods.

He'd take all that away

and put it in his storage.

We were the biggest operation

in Christiania.

We delivered to about ten stalls,

and we sold, uh, about

35 to 40 kilos a day.

We sold a lot of it outside

to avoid having to move

it into Christiania.

Typically, I would go to a grocery store.

I would have a shopping cart

with 25 kilograms in a bag

and meet up with someone else

who has a cart.

They have a bag with the money,

and we swap carts.

We meshed in seamlessly

with everyday life.

[Larsen] There are importers

bringing the weed into Denmark,

and they pass it on to middlemen

who then get it into Christiania.

In Christiana, weed is distributed

in the Community Kitchen.

And the police are well aware of that.

We knew it was going on in there.

In the mornings.

FLEMMING SLOTH ANDERSEN

RIOT SQUAD

In my mind,

it was very well-organized. Absolutely.

[Norton] The Community Kitchen is known

for kingpins hanging out inside.

But, it's also a place where they sell

weed to average people and tourists

and where they sell

to their regular customers.

[Tuxen] There was a lot of variety

in the Kitchen at that time.

There were seven or eight stalls. And each

had lots of different things available.

KLAUS TUXEN

ACTIVIST & FOUND OF HEMP PARTY

You knew your dealer.

They were always friendly.

If they had something new,

they would just give you a gram.

There wasn't anyone

who forced you to buy, no obligation.

Good service through and through.

I was good at getting up early in the

morning and getting myself a good spot.

When I got the good spot, I got more

customers than the others.

KURT NIELSEN

FORMER DRUG DEALER

[Kluck] You had 10 or 15 grams on you.

Then you had your scale

and hash strapped to your stomach.

You bit off a chunk, weighed it,

and sold it to the customer.

On to the next one.

[man] It has to be mixed.

There would be a paper tray

with a chunk of hashish.

It would be called Star of David

or French Paper or Maroc.

It was 50 kroner a gram at the time.

You couldn't sell it for more.

When we came in for the bust, this weed

and cash started flying off to the sides.

There was no one to fine, so we couldn't

arrest them for possessing hash

because it was considered

found hash and money.

Ultimately, then, our main purpose,

in my view, was to get it off the street.

Both the money and the hash.

[people shouting]

The perfect scenario

was for somebody to get caught.

That way I could raise

my own prices by a lot.

Or at least I'd sell

twice as much product.

One time, I was at the bench,

with my paper trays,

and a cop came up to me

and said, "Police. You're under arrest."

I broke loose, grabbed a chair,

and I threw it in his face.

Then I ran away and jumped

out the back window.

I was afraid that I was wanted,

and they would recognize me.

So I showed up

wearing a wig the next day.

I was, like, very cool and chill.

Usually, we got a warning

because there was a whistle.

So we usually had

a little bit of time to pack up.

I'd gotten the warning, so I just went

over and sat down with all the bums.

And I hid the weed

on the bottom side of a table.

And I just sat there

with all the bums in, uh, my wig.

And they just came up to us

and said, "You guys can go."

"See ya."

It was easy.

- [people chattering]

- [rock music playing]

[Jørgensen] More and more weed

was being sold.

To me, it was a major provocation.

And it was done so overtly.

PREBEN JØRGENSEN

RIOT SQUAD

It completely offended

my sense of justice, I was irate.

I wanted the place cleared out.

[woman] There's the press.

When I tell you

to butt out of police business,

you will obey, end of conversation.

In 1992, the police set up a new patrol

to focus specifically on Christiania.

They call it Christiania Patrol.

[woman] They caught two.

Police leadership decided

they wanted an operational manager

who had a good knowledge of Christiania.

MOGENS LAURIDSEN - FORMER HEAD

OF OPERATIONS & RIOT SQUAD

And I was a shoo-in because

I had nine years with Riot Squad.

I said yes, and was out there

about six months.

[contemplative music playing]

[Lykke] They supposedly

consisted of 40 officers.

Those 40 were tasked

with shutting down Pusher Street.

And they were fierce.

[Norton] The officers

that made up Christiania Patrol,

they were, many of them,

also Riot Squad members.

They are, in a way, lone wolves:

individualists both, in some respect,

a rather anarchistic approach

to police work.

It's something that actually

has a good deal of political backing.

When Christiania Patrol started, Denmark

had a rather conservative government,

which was interested in making

an example of Christiania.

[man 1] It's gotten out of control.

The police were granted

an additional ten million kroner.

They Well, they want to dismantle

the weed trade here in Christiania.

[man 2]

What's up, Jutland? What'll it be?

Street fighting in the area

around Christiania in Copenhagen

sent five police officers

to the emergency room.

The riots began when civilian officers

were conducting checks in Christiania

on the hash trade.

[Norton] The Riot Squad attracts

a very specific type of officer,

these are guys with a different background

and a different kind of esprit de corps.

The result is a sort of, um,

combat-ready, paramilitary unit

which descends on Christiania.

The police officers were all lined up

in a row. With big shields.

Plexiglass shields, and with helmets

and visors and batons.

[Lauridsen]

It was pretty violent at first.

We respond to a lot of conflicts.

[people shouting]

[whistle blowing]

They weren't very nice. They were angry.

They were fired up. And

A lot of them really liked to draw blood.

[people shouting]

When we strike,

we're there to make arrests.

And often they would lash out at us

or put up resistance during arrest.

Things get rough.

[Jørgensen] There was a lot

of money at stake.

And when people stand

to lose a lot of money,

you know, sometimes

that can me them very angry.

[Kluck] We were always getting

in fights with the cops.

If you got arrested

you had no choice but to fight back.

No choice. You don't want to get arrested.

Go away!

Some people would get really aggressive.

[people shouting]

[Nielsen] I loved yelling

and screaming and provoking them.

I was always right out there.

I had this idea I was a freedom fighter.

I fought so we could just be left

the hell alone

and smoke our weed.

[people shouting]

[intriguing music playing]

[Norton] Christiania Patrol has a number

of different attack strategies.

They make use, in part,

of a completely overt method,

in which they park their vehicles

out on Prinsessegade,

and then they go in, and they start

thoroughly ransacking the stalls,

from one end to the other.

They would start by forming a line,

about ten guys wide

going down Pusher Street.

Then they would all just start barreling

down the street like a snowplow.

Their message was abundantly clear.

They wanted to make it known:

"We are in charge here."

They also have

slightly more cunning attempts

to surprise the Christianites

and the dealers.

[Larsen] There's an operation

in the early nineties

where two officers

use a rather creative method

to get close and personal with a dealer.

One is in a wheelchair,

and the other plays the role of an aide.

[Jørgensen] Two officers thought it might

be fun to pull up in a wheelchair

and come in undercover like that

and observe a little bit.

I'm hanging out up in the Opera, watching.

There was a guy rolling up

with another guy,

who was sitting in a wheelchair.

When all of a sudden,

the guy in the wheelchair

jumped up to his feet,

and they started making arrests.

The dealers were too slow on the uptake

to realize that it was the police.

[chuckling] That, that really

pissed them off.

[Norton] It's something that Christianites

and drug dealers complain about.

they take issue with the police using

dishonest methods to gain access,

because the police are doing everything

they can think of

to catch people off guard,

to bring them in.

[Kluck] People are yelling and screaming.

[woman] What the hell

are you doing to me?

Nobody on the street that day

realized that the guy in the wheelchair,

he was a cop.

[man shouting]

[Lykke] I walk around

to the back of the house

and see that the people on The Line

are fighting with the police,

trying to free the people that got busted.

[people screaming]

I heard something going down, and

as I ran up the street, I was thinking,

"I need to bring some rocks."

[ominous music playing]

So I quickly fill my pockets with rocks

and run back up the street

to see what's going on.

Then more cops show up and

eventually, yeah, some rocks were thrown.

It was w*r.

[person] Stop it!

[Jørgensen] We were completely

bombarded with rocks.

Anything they can find to throw, really.

It happened time and time again.

They came from all sides,

and there was no way to see them all.

If you get hit by a rock, that's it.

You're done for.

"Watch out!" And a rock would

come down. [mimics thud]

You're absolutely dead if you get hit

in the head by one of those.

[Andersen] We had to pull out our batons.

Things got intense and we used them.

We used them in order to assert ourselves.

[people shouting]

You don't aim for the head,

since it's a dangerous weapon.

But in the heat of battle,

a lot of things can happen.

We've had people accidentally get hit

in the head by a baton, it happens.

[man] What the hell are you doing?!

[Kluck] They were crazy.

They would force you down to the ground,

even if there was no reason for it.

They'd kneel on your back,

kick your shin, or slam you down.

I mean, it was brutal.

The rioters even sicced their dogs on us,

but they got whacked with the baton.

We couldn't lose. No way.

[man] as*h*le!

They were insane, those police boys.

[man] It's legal. Stay away.

Let's go, let's go.

[Nielsen] They just cared

about their work.

They were completely obsessed with

shutting it down and taking us down too.

[people shouting]

[Andersen] The Christianites

were so preoccupied with declaring

What am I being charged with?

how violent we were.

Our best asset was their fear of us.

They knew they couldn't beat us.

That was my impression.

They knew they couldn't win.

[Jørgensen] If they offered to dance,

we accepted.

The fact that were much better dancers,

well, that was a different matter.

[people shouting]

[Lauridsen] One day, no matter

which way I turned my head,

there were police officers engaged

in a fight with the Christiania people.

On our way out, some of the Christianites

would shout after us,

"Don't come back here today."

You can't say that to police.

It's an invitation you just can't refuse.

Of course we went back in.

[man] We're allowed to go

wherever the f*ck we want, man!

We're allowed to go where we want!

[Lauridsen] It's crude,

but we have no choice

but to show strength

when the situation proves it necessary.

Once we've started, we have to finish.

Because we're the police.

What the hell are you doing?

You're agitating us!

I'll say something that some people

might take the wrong way.

It was a playground.

It was exciting,

and the adrenaline was pumping.

We knew there'd be trouble

when we showed up.

You can get addicted to that.

[man] Mommy's calling.

Go home to Mommy.

[Kluck] We thought, "f*ck them."

Plain and simple.

We had no respect for them

or their games.

[people shouting]

I know, I have been told

by former police officers

these guys got each other all worked up

to fight the people of Christiania.

They'd get good and ready

to go beat up on Christianites.

This is tear gas used by the police today.

This affected

and hurt innocent people, too.

[Lykke] All of Christiania, and even the

surrounding areas, were shrouded in gas.

You couldn't get around.

[people shouting]

It was really extremely ugly.

[man] We see your faces! Remember that!

[man] You guys are so cool!

You're so cool!

Go home, you idiots!

At one point during all this,

a cop opened up his coveralls.

Underneath, he had on this T-shirt.

I got a good look at that sh*t.

It said "Christiania Rangers."

A T-shirt they had made.

They They were so proud of themselves.

[contemplative music playing]

The police only saw

the bad side of Christiania.

Combatting crime: that's what the police

are put in the world for.

So it's understandable that

that was why we only saw the bad.

There were lots of nice,

cozy places and very kind people.

A lot of cops never got the opportunity

to experience those aspects of it.

Their impression

was influenced by the fact

that there was always so much trouble.

It's dangerous

and you get rocks thrown at you,

and you end up in conflict every time.

That makes you think, "Wow, this place

is awful, this place sucks."

A whole lot of officers

were seriously injured

while they were doing their jobs

in Christiania, that's for sure.

So it's not like it was without perils.

I get stopped at all hours.

I go get food, what happens?

I get stopped, searched,

and stripped down.

That's something I've come to expect.

I accept that, okay.

You wanna criminalize me

as a Christianite, that's your problem.

You all are small to me.

I've noticed that each of you guys

love to say, "See my patch here.

It says "police", and it releases me

from accountability.

I'm just doing my job."

Yes? Yes? Okay, wait.

You guys all act like robots,

like you have one mind.

But I know you're not,

I know that, I know you're not.

You know, I have never once heard

a police officer say, "I'm wrong."

But we've both heard

the Christianites say that many times.

They're tougher than we're used to.

But they can't bring us down.

[playing lively music]

[people chanting]

I'm telling you,

I made fun of those cops a lot.

We did this several times, from the roofs,

Woodstock, the Community Kitchen.

There were milk crates

with month-old yogurt and rotten eggs.

And when they came, they got all of it.

[Nielsen] I never threw rocks,

not even one time.

And I really don't like violence at all.

So I threw, uh, eggs and yogurt,

aiming for their shields,

so they couldn't see through them.

They definitely got pretty mad,

they really didn't like that.

[The Wholesaler] That turned out

to be a much more effective system.

Turns out smelling like rotten eggs was,

um, worse than a rock caving your head in.

Much of the Christianites'

teasing seemed harmless and comical.

There was a sense of humor to it.

But there were also personal attacks

and insults leveled

at individual officers.

[people shouting and chanting]

They used tricks

to ridicule us in all kinds of places.

[Andersen] There was a picture of me

that was displayed around the city.

All over Christiania.

Myself, along with

10 to 15 of my colleagues.

[Jørgensen] There were also officers who

were approached where they lived,

their residences,

and their children were approached.

So, yes the threats were extremely real.

[intriguing music playing]

[Andersen] I knew

I could get shot. [chuckles]

I know that sounds very intense,

but that was my job.

I'd made my peace with the reality of it.

I could risk it, for my part.

It's what came along

with working in that department.

What scared me was when the threats

started to come against my family.

Yeah, they received threats as well.

My daughter who wasn't

even one year old.

That scared me.

It really wasn't fun anymore.

For long periods I went around always

carrying a p*stol, tucked away.

They knew, I was

an undercover cop, you know.

If that led to a dangerous situation,

I was ready.

[Jørgensen] It put you at ease, you know?

You never knew when things

would get out of hand.

- [whistle blowing]

- [people shouting]

[man] You're a joke.

[Lykke] It was a horrific period.

There were some really tough Christianites

who were deeply involved with

and vigilant about the hash market,

some preparing rather extreme

and violent counterattacks.

I witnessed some riot cops who were

all ransacking a children's sandbox.

They found a pile of iron pipes,

70 to 80 centimeters long.

Someone must have

hidden them presumably.

[people shouting]

[Larsen] The violence and hatred between

dealers and police got worse and worse.

Among all of the peaceful Christianites,

which were in the majority,

concern was growing

that this could end up being disastrous.

We were afraid that if it escalated,

it was a matter of time

before we had a m*rder on our hands.

We didn't know what side would suffer.

It didn't take long.

It was the 18th of May, on Nurrebro.

[reporter] Pushed to the limit,

police opened fire on a civilian crowd

for the first time since World w*r Two.

The events of that day marked the

beginning of the end for the Riot Squad.

The Riot Squad is being met

with a great deal of opposition.

The police unit has often been criticized,

but it's never been closer

to being shut down than now.

In mid 1993,

there were two major incidents

that were particularly prominent

in the news cycles

throughout the whole country of Denmark.

The first, were the riots at Nørrebro

on the 18th of May 1993,

after Danes voted yes

on the Maastricht Treaty.

There had been a great deal

of anger in left-wing circles,

and following the outcome of the vote,

it triggered major riots at Nørrebro.

The riots became quite violent,

and 11 protesters were injured,

as well as several police officers,

who were sent there to keep the peace.

The second was the Benjamin case.

A violent arrest that took place

at Rådhuspladsen

on New Year's Eve of '91, '92,

where a young man

was placed in a so-called "leg lock".

[quiet dramatic music playing]

The arrest ultimately ended fatally

with the young man being fully crippled

and subsequently losing his life,

due to the injuries he sustained.

In a leg lock,

you're handcuffed behind your back.

And then your legs are attached

to the handcuffs,

so you're lying like a taut bow.

[Norton] Being held in that position

can make it impossible to breathe,

and the excessive use of it

sparks major concerns

about the methods and practices police

are using among the general public.

Danish police are heavily criticized

for using the leg-lock,

which was known to be dangerous.

This controversy

made its way to Christiania.

[Andersen] Public sentiment

about our work was drastically changing.

The Riot Squad as a group,

an organization, if you will,

created this atmosphere.

That's how it was.

Except we were just doing our jobs.

When they attacked us,

we had to fight back.

And that looked violent.

My most violent arrest was probably

the day that I was leg-locked.

And then, I was carried

by my arms to their van.

I was put in the van, in the leg lock,

and then taken to Horhoosvi

where they held me.

My wrists were bleeding like crazy.

They finally released me after an hour,

because I was shouting

for a doctor.

Fixed leg lock. It wasn't, you know,

because we thought it was fun.

But because when you're dealing

with an arrest on the ground,

you have to be able to keep an eye out

in case somebody's throwing rocks at you.

When you're in plain clothes,

you don't have any protection.

So it's true

that we used the fixed leg lock often,

but then after this controversy

is was banned.

[man] I need to take off my shoes.

[Norton] After the Christiania Patrol

has been active a year and a half,

the residents decide, after

consulting with their lawyer,

to write a letter to the justice

minister who, in '93,

is Social Democrat Erling Olsen.

Justice minister Erling Olsen

has urged police to be less aggressive

with the marijuana trade on Christiania.

He banned the Christiania Patrol

from using tear gas.

[man] All right, Erling! All right!

Justice Minister Erling

took the matter so seriously

that he paid Christiania a visit.

It culminated with the police showing up

and barging into Pusher Street.

They made quite a violent appearance.

He was at the Opera when suddenly,

all these officers showed up.

[people shouting]

He went and looked out the window.

He saw Christianites being hit by batons.

[Lykke] Since they used tear gas

in his presence, he said, "That's it."

He shut down the Christiania Patrol.

We will, in any case,

initiate a scaling-down and dampening

of invasive police activity

in Christiania.

[Norton] By the end of December, 1993,

what was referred to

as the "Christmas peace" was brokered

and put into full effect.

From that point forward,

the police had officially been ordered

to completely stop patrolling

Pusher Street indefinitely.

It was like we'd won a victory.

We celebrated

by sharing a bottle of vodka.

We were all relieved that what had

happened with the tragedy in Nørrebro

didn't happen in Christiania.

It was all about the Christiania Patrol.

It was that organization

that really f*cked things up out there.

[man] Across the street,

we have our bakery.

[chuckles]

With Erling Olsen, we all thought he caved

and that he was weak and wimpy.

But we knew there were

all kinds politics involved in it.

To me it was just one of those times.

I wasn't impressed at all.

I don't know if I'm allowed

to say bullshit, but it was.

It was just talk.

Like many times before.

[Jørgensen] It was a betrayal, simply put.

We were taking care of things

for a whole year

and we confiscated so much weed.

Then he came and interfered,

and I think it's a betrayal.

I think it was inappropriate

interference. Absolutely.

[Lauridsen] It's a difficult place

to be in because you don't get praise

when you're there as a police officer.

It's a tough environment.

The officers felt it was a really

ungrateful way of ending things.

They felt they had invested a lot

of their time and energy into this job

with not much recognition.

But I'll say it, they did one hell

of a job out there. That much is for sure.

[Jørgensen] The only way to handle it: you

had to grab the dealers by their ba*ls.

They should have kept going,

and Christiania would've closed down.

[Lauridsen] I think we had

a good handle on the weed trade.

It was minimal compared to what

it had previously been in Christiania.

I'll probably be alone on that.

If you were to ask the Christianites,

they'd say nothing changed.

But the cannabis dealers always told us,

"If things keep up like this

and don't change, we'll move along.

It's more trouble than it's worth."

So we definitely hurt them a little bit.

They closed the Community Kitchen.

When the dust settled

it never really restarted.

Um

Other than that,

they didn't achieve much.

[Kluck] They didn't get sh*t out of it.

Nothing.

Whether they were winning or not,

is not the point.

The cops were there to do

what they thought their job was.

But the weed trade in Christiania

was always most heavily, um

under pressure by the major players

in the market

or a potential drought in Morocco.

There was no real threat there

from the police.

[dramatic music playing]

[Norton] For Pusher Street,

the Christmas Peace of 1993

was the beginning of what is referred

to as the "police-free period".

The police only really came

when there was a case outside Christiania

that lead into Christiania.

[Norton] That also means that the people

who had stalls on Pusher Street

started adopting a new kind of confidence

in what they were doing.

So, Pusher Street transformed

into a kind of supermarket,

a real weed supermarket.

A far cry from just being

a more haphazard, makeshift marketplace.

[melodic dramatic music playing]

We didn't see the cops much.

So people relaxed.

There was peace.

Oh, that's why I was so flush with cash

in '94. I was doing well.

I'll tell you this much.

I had a gold chain that weighed 450 grams.

It was cool.

I had a car and a motorcycle, a boat.

Jet skis and scooters

I had saved up for all that

with my welfare checks. Yeah.

[The Wholesaler]

On a typical cannabis deal, I, uh,

I think I got 350,000.

The money was everywhere

and it was extremely easy to make.

We did a great job of rewarding ourselves

with booze and cocaine and women.

Whatever else we wanted

because the sky was the limit.

But suddenly, the bikers got involved.

The bikers had caught the scent

of how big our business had grown.

[Norton] So now,

during this police-free period,

Pusher Street saw some much bigger

and much stronger players emerge

on the weed market.

As for the Hells Angels,

if you asked the Copenhagen Police

through the nineties,

the Hells Angels were starting

to have a larger presence as well,

including taking over stalls.

That is to say, there were some people

who demanded a cut of the earnings

from some of the stalls out there,

through no small amount of intimidation.

[tense music playing]

[Lauridsen] Some of the dealers

at that time,

they definitely had ties

and connections to the Hells Angels.

We suspected that one of the guys

that was selling had a stash of sorts

not far from Multimediehuset.

And when we conducted a search,

we found 25 kilos in a box.

We confiscated the box as found hash

and kept up surveillance.

The day after we brought in the 25 kilos,

two very prominent Hells Angels members

came out and grabbed the dealer

on Pusher Street.

They dragged him into the back

of the Opera, and, well,

we don't know exactly

what they discussed.

So then he came back

and started selling nonstop,

especially at night when we weren't there.

He was trying to scrape some money

together, it was all very telling.

It was clear that he had a relationship

with the Hells Angels.

He was obviously

getting his drugs from them.

[The Wholesaler] The bikers

were always pretty persistent,

and it created a lot of disruption.

So we said, "We need to have a meeting."

My people and this, uh, yeah, biker g*ng.

That was when Mister Big, um,

he decided to set up the meeting

at Kongs Newtow Restaurant Bali.

Restaurant Bali was run by a, um,

man from Singapore.

Ethnically Chinese.

Named Roland Tan Tong Meng,

he was in the Copenhagen underworld,

known as Mr. Big.

I've heard people

from the underworld describe him

as some kind of criminal mediator.

He was the guy you could turn to

if you were in trouble

or if you had problems

that couldn't be resolved any other way.

What the biker gangs said to the dealers,

and the wholesalers who were working

the stalls on Pusher Street,

was, "All right, for every single gram

of weed sold on Pusher Street,

we need to get a cut of that sale."

It's not something the dealers

were particularly interested in doing.

[The Wholesaler] Not long after,

there was a knock at my door.

I answered.

Outside, I saw someone in a hoodie,

and then I got hit by a baseball

bat right to the head.

Another one.

The second blow knocked me out.

That was just one instance.

Then let's see, well, at some other

point, my partner and I get a message.

We're on Refshalalevej,

around the back of Christiania,

near Løvehuset, the two of us.

As we stop there, somebody,

um, pulls up in an Opel Astra.

Flashes their lights, and I think

they're trying to tell us something.

We had pistols because we'd

been exposed to all kinds of crazy stuff.

So when we saw that car, we threw our

g*ns under our own car and I walked over.

A guy gets out and he says

"It's the police."

"Good day," I say to him,

and I turn to go inside.

But now I can see my partner

is going over to them.

I'm inside and then my partner

comes in, and he says,

"They heard that there's a hit out,

so they have to inform us."

I'm like, "Well, that sucks."

The cops told my partner,

"Those g*ns you threw under the car,

you better take them.

You probably need them

a whole lot more than we do."

So at that point,

I was thinking to myself,

I was thinking

"Okay, the police let us keep our g*ns.

There may be some merit to this."

We

thought we knew who was behind it.

They wanted to make a point.

To say loud and clear, "We are in charge."

You, uh

You get scared when you're told

you're going to, um,

be assassinated, of course you do.

Yeah. Um and

And anyone who says otherwise is a liar.

Full stop, I'm telling you.

I think it became sort of a way out

for me. To turn my back.

You know, people die over this. Yeah.

But this was just the very beginning

of all the violence surrounding weed.

ON THE NEXT EPISODE

[man] We need heavier intervention.

he government is founded on revoking

Christiania's freetown designation.

[man 1] We'll fight fire with fire.

[producer] If I say "Bjarne"?

Leglock?

He's the cop who thought

he could shut down Christiania.

[Beier] I saw him as Alexander

on his stallion.

I mean I would have done

anything for him.

[Christensen]

The goal was to "normalize" Christiania.

So naturally that meant we were

in Christiania 24 seven.

I was furious.

Police were everywhere.

For us Christiania kids,

you know, it became normal.

I always said,

"When we strike, we follow through."

They have to feel it.

We won't take their sh*t.

If they're tough, we're tough.

[people shouting]

I felt great. It was a pleasure.

HELLS ANGELS MC HAS NO

COMMENTED ON THE ALLEGATIONS

[tense dramatic music playing]