Category
Smuggling
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Asia, North America, Smuggling
Blasts and whimpers from the past
As Rob recently noted, it’s been a while since we’ve written material for the site. While the break has been a good opportunity to catch my breath and get on with some other things, it’s about time I got off my all-too-skinny posterior and back into the swing of all things rehabology.com. And I thought that before I got into some more in-depth stories - or rambling ones depending on your point of view - it would be good to do a little update on a few stories I’ve blogged about in the past.
It’s been quite a few month’s since we encountered the case that was making headlines in India, that of drug charges against Rahul Mahajan, the son of a former top BJP official. You may recall that in August of last year a charge sheet had just been filed against him, this after that fateful early morning in June when he and his father’s ex-aide, Vivek Maitra, were rushed to hospital after apparent overdoses of illegal drugs, with the latter dead on arrival. Well, a trial date has finally been set for the 21st of February, when Mahajan, who has pleaded not guilty, will face charges of illegal possession of drugs, along with abetment and criminal conspiracy. His co-accused, Sahil Zaroo, and Mahajan’s assistant, Harish Sharma, also face various drugs charges; two Nigerians who are said to have supplied the drugs in question also face charges.
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Africa, North America, Smuggling, War on Drugs
Qat’s out of the bag
It was with some dismay yet no surprise that I started to stumble across more and more news articles (Just Google and see) that yet another immigrant culture was starting to clash with good old American principals yet again. This time it wasn’t what has become the steady daily news making issue of Islamic immigrants assimilating into mainstream America, but this time it was about a cultural habit. An ancient habit common to East Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. Qat chewing. Not unlike the good old boys of rural America chewing tobacco (and for lots of the same reasons) this activity has all manner of social and physiologic roles it plays in it’s respective societies. While embraced by some and reviled by others its use has been anchored by more than one culture. My own theory about the recent Ethiopian invasion of Somalia is that it had more to do with the Islamists banning qat usage thereby interrupting the plants flow than it did about personal freedoms and the threat of fundamental Islam. Call me crazy, it’s ok, I can take it.
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Europe, Smuggling
£5m penalties for tobacco manufacturers who aid smuggling
HM Revenue & Customs has issued a press release detailing the UK government’s plans to fine tobacco companies who don’t do enough to ensure that cigarettes and hand rolling tobacco are not smuggled into the country, depriving authorities of tax money.
Tobacco companies will, amongst other things, be expected to know “their markets”, only supply them “in quantities that reflect legitimate demand”, “know their customers” and only supply “those who are legitimate and law-abiding”. I wonder if they will be issued with cool tax collector badges as well, not to mention expert lectures on how the market works.
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Africa, Smuggling, War on Drugs
Five policemen arrested in missing cocaine case in Ghana
As mentioned here several times, the reputation of certain Ghana’s law enforcement agencies has been taking a bit of a hit internationally and locally after the scandal of an alleged 77 parcels of cocaine having gone missing from the MV Benjamin that was raided off Ghana’s coast a few months ago.
Five policemen have now been arrested in the past week, after purportedly going to the beach after news of the bust was made and returning without making any arrests, according to police sources who spoke to the Ghanaian Chronicle, with the implication that the cops were corrupt. Corruption allegations have gone far up the police ladder after a conversation between alleged drug dealers - who have been arrested - about the disappearance of the drugs having been recorded in the house of the Assistant Commissioner of Police Kofi Boakye.
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Latin America, Smuggling, War on Drugs
Two top Guatemala drug-cops plead guilty to conspiracy charges
Adan Castillo (see right) and Jorge Aguilar Garcia, the former chief and second in command, respectively, of Guatemala’s leading anti-narcotics police agency, the SAIA (Servicio de Analisis e Informacion Anti-narcoticos), have pled guilty in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to a “charge of conspiracy to manufacture and distribute five kilograms or more of cocaine, knowing and intending that the cocaine would be imported into the United States”.According to a U.S. Department of Justice press release, whose headline (”Former Guatemalan Senior Anti-Narcotics Officers Plead Guilty to Conspiracy to Manufacture and Distribute Cocaine”, 7 September 2006) somewhat understates their seniority, the two men were caught back in late 2005 accepting $25,000 from an undercover DEA informant, as a first payment to protect a drug shipment on its way to the United States. And then, unbeknownst to them, they were indicted by a federal grand jury, lured to the U.S. by a fake invitation to attend an anti-drugs training and then promptly arrested. They now face sentencing on the 17th of November 2006. As part of their plea bargain they will each face 10 years in jail before being sent back to Guatemala.
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Asia, Smuggling
Japan Seizures Plummet After N. Korean Bust
Japanese newspapers are reporting that the amount of drug seizures in the country has fallen drastically due to the siezure of a North Korean drug smuggling vessel in May.According to the National Police Agency, there has been over an 85% drop in drug seizures compared to the same time last year.
There are however a few things that should be mentioned here.
For starters, it is no particular secret that the government of North Korea makes some serious coin from drug smuggling - usually heroin. Drug shipments have been intercepted on their way to China, Japan and even Australia where a North Korean official was even arrested on the drug vessel. Being so strapped means that Kim Jong Il and the boys have to get a little inventive with their cash flow situation and smuggling helps fill the gap.
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Caribbean, North America, Smuggling, War on Drugs
Prosecution given 45 more days in Shaheed Roger Khan drug case
08.10.06 | Permalink | 2 Comments
It seems that Shaheed Roger Khan will have to wait until late September to have his day in a Brooklyn court on drugs charges, after prosecutors from the Eastern New York District Attorney’s Office requested and were granted another 45 days to build their case, citing its complexity. This was after Khan’s lead defence attorney, John Bergendahl, had filed a motion in a New York court asking for the dismissal of his client’s indictment because of its “cryptic form” and the possibility that Khan could go into the trial “blind”.Khan, a controversial businessman from Guyana, was indicted in April this year on charges of conspiring to import five kilograms or more of cocaine into the U.S between January 2001 and March 2006. This followed and was then followed up by several run-ins with authorities in Guyana and Suriname, respectively, over alleged weapons and drug smuggling offences. (For the complete details and timeline in this case, see my previous article.)
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Europe, North America, People, Smuggling
Giles Carlyle-Clarke given bail
Giles Carlyle-Clarke, an Englishman of aristocratic lineage who was recently extradited to the United States because of a marijuana smuggling charge dating back to the 1980s, has been granted bail set at $464,000 and will be monitored electronically while under house arrest. He will only be released from the Baldwin County Corrections Center, Alabama, once he has drummed up the finances for the bond and has found a place to live; his lawyer, Jeff Deen, offered to let him stay at his place but U.S. Magistrate Judge William Cassady rejected this option due to “potential conflicts”.
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Africa, Smuggling
Kenyan Prosecutor in David Mugo Kiragu cocaine case hits back
I recently posted excerpts from a guest column in the Kenyan newspaper The Nation by Philip Murgor, a former director of public prosecutions, in which he chided the investigation into a large 2004 cocaine bust and the subsequent prosecution of seven suspects; it netted only one guilty charge, that against David Mugo Kiragu. One particular target of his scorn was the police who:
rejected the appointment of a competent and specially trained prosecutor in anti-narcotics investigations and prosecutions. Skeleton investigation files finally received reflected shoddy investigations with vital evidence missing.
The man who went on to prosecute the case, J-Oriri Onyango, was understandably not amused at the implication that he was not competent and wrote a letter [free registration required] to The Nation to this effect, squarely taking aim at Murgor, who was indeed the Director of Public Prosecutions at the time:
[A]ll the State counsel in the DPP’s department, including myself, are competent to prosecute all criminal cases without bias. Indeed there is no State counsel trained to prosecute a particular criminal case, as alleged by Mr Murgor.
The murder case involving Mr Kamlesh Pattni, which was prosecuted dismally by Mr Murgor, did not require a trained prosecutor in homicide investigations and prosecution.
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Asia, Smuggling
Patric Thomas Malujo gets 10 years of “rigorous imprisonment”
Patric Thomas Malujo, a British national, has been sentenced to ten years of “rigorous imprisonment” - hard labour - by an Indian court for smuggling charas (hashish) plus a fine of 100,000 rupees (US$2,100).There aren’t too many details on the case other than in November 2003 one of three unattended bags on a bus from Delhi to Mumbai were found by police to contain 35 packets of charas. They were picked up from two seats that had been booked by Malujo and another Brit, John Donho. In February 2004 Mumbia police arrested Malujo. Donho, who still faces trial, was picked up in Goa. Malujo will appeal to the Rajasthan High Court.
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