Germany and Poland smash doping ring-police, By: Louis Charbonneau

BERLIN (Reuters) - Police raided over 50 buildings and arrested 10 suspects in Germany and Poland on Tuesday to smash a criminal ring that sold anabolic steroids used in illegal sports doping, German police said.

The police said buildings were searched in Berlin, the German states of Brandenburg and Lower Saxony, as well as in neighbouring Poland.

"There were 10 suspects arrested and 52 buildings searched in Germany and Poland, mostly in Berlin and Hanover," senior Berlin criminal investigator Uwe Schmidt told reporters.

He said that some 240 police officers participated in the raids, which also seized cars loaded with anabolic steroids and some 70,000 euros (47,000 pounds) in cash.

Schmidt said that the doping ring had no connection to any sports besides bodybuilding.

Berlin prosecutor Thorsten Cloidt told reporters: "This is a European wide network."

While German police were busy across the border, Polish police arrested Boris K., a German bodybuilder suspected of leading the German-based gang that made, smuggled and sold anabolic steroids, Polish police said in a statement.

The police said a number of Boris K.'s associates were also arrested.

Boris K. had been hiding out in Kielpino, a village near the northern Polish city of Gdansk since other members of his gang were caught smuggling steroids worth 100,000 euros a few months ago, police said.

Boris K. had continued to lead the Germany-based group by phone and email, they said. They said his group promoted steroids on a Web site, which they also used to transfer secret information and codes to each other.

Polish police said they had observed Boris K. for months before getting the go-ahead from German police to arrest him.

Gdansk police spokeswoman Danuta Wolk-Karaczewska said Boris K. was 31 years old. She said he was arrested in a raid on a house in Kielpino at around 0400 GMT (5 a.m. British time) this morning. Hundreds of steroid pills and marijuana were found in the raid.