NSW Police are investigating whether a "filthy" clandestine drug laboratory in Sydney's southwest is linked to the deaths of two people at Sydney music festival Defqon.1.
Detectives raided a rural property on Calf Farm Road at Mt Hunter, west of Camden, on October 24 and uncovered drugs with an estimated street value of $5.2 million.
Among the 450 items seized were more than 21kg of MDMA powder and pills, 28 litres of GHB, 13.5kg of precursors, an amount of substances believed to be cocaine, steroids and methylamphetamine, ammunition, and equipment used to manufacture drugs, police said on Sunday.
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Following the discovery, a 39-year-old man was charged with a raft of drugs offences and police say further arrests are likely.
Acting Assistant Commissioner Stuart Smith believes the 39-year-old man didn't act alone as the lab was "pushing out pills every second" and was "so sophisticated" in its operation.
Mr Smith said the lab was set up at an industrial size and allegedly manufactured tablets for the dance party season and nightclub scene.
"We have uncovered tablet dyes and certainly chemicals from this particular clandestine lab which are not dissimilar to what we saw at the Defqon.1 festival at Penrith in September," Mr Smith told reporters in Sydney on Sunday.
"This is a filthy, dirty premises. It is a grubby lab."
A Sydney man, 23, and a Victorian woman, 21, collapsed at the festival in Castlereagh on September 15 and died a short time later in nearby Nepean hospital.
Mr Smith said 11 other people went to hospital with a "significant" presence of prohibited drugs in their system.
Detectives uncovered triangle-shaped pill stamps from the lab which were "not dissimilar" to those seized at the festival and a "parent chemical" known as MDA, which was found in the 11 people who were hospitalised from overdoses, he added.
"These chemicals are not meant for the human body," Mr Smith said.
The 39-year-old man was refused bail at Campbelltown Local Court on October 26 and is due to reappear at the same court on December 19.
