Stores Plant Mosquitos To Repel Youth

A noise-making device that drives away rowdy youth with an irritating high-pitched squeal has quietly landed on Canadian shores after a raucous European debut.

The Mosquito emits a high-frequency screech that can be heard only by young ears, raising claims of discrimination in some European quarters while giving hundreds of business owners peace and quiet from unruly young crowds.

Bureaucrats from the City of Montreal are studying whether the device could legally be used to clear young drug dealers and bums from scary city tunnels, but the machine is already a hit among some West Coast businesses.

So far 150 Mosquitos with a starting price of $1,250 have been sold in Canada. British Columbia has the most customers so far, although test units have also been installed in Alberta and Saskatchewan.

Moving Sound Technologies Inc., the Mosquito's Vancouver-based distributor, has set up sales offices in Toronto and Montreal, anticipating big demand will follow sunny spring weather.

"It's awesome," said Lisa Deacon, manager of the 57 Below Bar and Liquor Store in New Westminster, B.C. The bar was one of the first North American businesses to try the device, in 2006.

"It turns on at night and keeps away all the young punks who hang out at the SkyTrain station."

Two Mac's convenience stores in Victoria have used the Mosquito to clear out drug dealers while two others in Richmond, B.C., have used the squealing machine to clear massive crowds of teenagers.

"We use them to deal with a worst-case scenario," said Geoff Higuchi, operations manager for Mac's in B.C.

"We love kids, kids are huge part of our business. So it's not the be-all, end-all tool, but it's one more tool to add to the arsenal if other methods don't work, such as policing."

The Mosquito, created by Welsh inventor Howard Stapleton, emits a pulsing noise above 16,000 hertz that capitalizes on the fact most humans can catch the mind-numbing frequency only between the age of 13 and 25.

The sound is not especially loud at 85 decibels but is extremely irritating for young, sensitive ears.

The device, which disperses even the most determined youthful crowd, is designed to operate for 20 minutes, although some schools and parks use it overnight to prevent vandalism.

"I think it is a shame to add yet more noise into the environment, but it is a little bit of a case of what else can you do," Stapleton said from his home in Wales.

"It doesn't hurt them, it's simply so damned annoying that they won't hang around. They move away, customers return to shops, and people end up getting the peaceful life that they have paid for and they deserve."

The discriminatory nature of the Mosquito has raised a buzz of opposition among some European human rights advocates who say the 13-to-25 set have the right to gather in parking lots and on library front steps. Some European politicians have called for a ban.

Quebec's human rights watchdog is raising similar concerns, saying young people have the right to assemble in public places in peace and quiet, just like adults.

"What's problematic is that it targets an entire segment of population, everyone under 25 years of age, even people who have nothing to do with stories of vandalism," said Diep Truong of the province's human rights and youth rights commission.

"It aims far too widely. It presumes they're all causing disturbances."

The machine has especially caught on in the UK, where some 5,000 have been sold to counter the loutish "yob" behaviour that has become a particular problem. In many British cities, young drinkers routinely mill about on the streets after closing time, getting into fistfights and vandalizing stores.

"I get reamed out by the human rights people, but what else are you supposed to do?" Stapleton said.

"When you were a lad of 12 or 13, you wouldn't have spat into the face of a police officer and told him (where to go.) That's what's happening here in the UK. They know how far they can push without getting into trouble. There's very little police can do about general bad behaviour."

Stapleton invented the device a few years ago, after his 15-year-old daughter was hara**ed by a gang of teenage boys at a store.

When the security engineer complained to the shopkeeper, the hapless merchant challenged Stapleton to come up with a solution.

The inventor first thought of the attempts some stores in North America had made to play classical music in malls and other areas where youth congregate. But Britain outlaws playing music outside stores after 9 p.m., plus merchants would have to pay a performance licensing fee for playing the music.

That's when his mind cast back to his youth, when he was an early teen visiting a factory where he was assaulted by a high-pitched sound the adults couldn't hear.

Stapleton tested the device on his five children before using it to disperse the rowdy gang at his neighbourhood store.

"I used my children as guinea pigs because I don't actually hear the device myself," he said.

He expected he would build and install a few machines a year "to help pay for the kids' Christmas presents."

Instead, the company had nearly $2 million in sales last year.

"I never realized the size of the problem," Stapleton said.