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Smuggling

Asia, Europe, Smuggling
An update on Badruddoza Chowdhury Momen
07.17.06 | Permalink | Comment?

Last month I wrote about Badruddoza Chowdhury Momen, the Bangladeshi businessman who was arrested in May on charges of smuggling heroin into the United Kingdom and then denied bail.

Well, it turns that he has since then confessed to police and a magistrate that he was involved in smuggling the drugs through ghost companies tied to BD Foods Limited, the food import company he is the chairman of. He has secured three months interim bail, although prosecutors have appealed this ruling.
Latin America, Smuggling, War on Drugs
Bust of Don Quixote author bust in Colombian cocaine bust
07.16.06 | Permalink | Comment?

This story made me chuckle when I first read it, as much for the delicious pun in the first paragraph of the accompanying news article as the ineptness of the crooks involved.

A metre and a half statue of Miguel de Cervantes, the author of the novel Don Quixote, was due to be sent on a cargo plane from Bogota to Spain when, during a routine check, police noticed that the cost of shipping the package was three times the value of the statue.
Caribbean, North America, Smuggling, War on Drugs
Guyanese government wants answers over arrest of Shaheed Roger Khan
07.14.06 | Permalink | Comment?

The government of Guyana has indicated that it is officially seeking information from the governments of the United States, Suriname and Trinidad over whether Shaheed Roger Khan, the businessman and alleged drug trafficker now facing drugs charges in a U.S. court, was kidnapped from a Trinidad airport while on his way back to Guyana.

Khan had been deported from Suriname in June after having earlier being arrested on drugs and arms charges; he had faced similar charges in Guyana before fleeing to Suriname. Meanwhile, his attorney’s have failed in a court bid to get Surinamese authorities to reverse his expulsion order and be returned. The Guyanese government, I suspect, will have about as much success.

The story so far:

* Shaheed Roger Khan, a businessman and widely suspected drug trafficker, is linked to the disappearance of assault rifles from a Guyanese military base in March; he denies the charges. Raids of his businesses and properties unearth some cocaine and illegal weapons. Khan subsequently disappears.

* Khan is indicted in a Brooklyn court in April for conspiracy to import five or more kilograms of cocaine into the U.S between January 2001 and March 2006. The previous month he had been named as a major drug trafficker in the US government’s annual narcotics report.

* Khan is arrested in Suriname in June, along with three former policemen, after authorities netted over 200 kilograms of cocaine and some weapons and ammunition in a raid. He is then accused by the Surinamese Justice Minister of planning and ordering the assassination of prominent Surinamese public officials.
Europe, Smuggling
London police renew appeal for info on deceased female Ghanaian drug smuggler
07.13.06 | Permalink | Comment?

Police in London are asking again for anyone who recognises the woman - thought to be from Ghana - who died in late May as result of swallowing 61 packages of what is suspected to be cocaine to come forward so that her family can be notified.

Although the woman identified herself as Mary Kofi, police suspect she was using a false name. She is described as being in her late 40s, of heavy build and five foot 10 inches tall, and was wearing a distinctive red print dress, silver shoes and had red-tinted extensions in her hair.

“Mary” was found on the 29th of May, a Bank Holiday Monday, by staff of St Helier Hospital in Sutton, south-west London, sitting on a wall outside and complaining of severe stomach pains. Most likely dumped at the hospital by her handlers as the bags leaked their contents - toxicology results are not yet in - she had no identification on her. She told hospital staff she was on a flight from Ghana and had cocaine in her stomach. Staff at Heathrow airport didn’t recognise her.

Police contact details are as follows:

* Detective Constable Suzanne Bainbridge on 020 8649 0731 (international code = 44)
* Crimestoppers on 0800555111.
North America, Smuggling, War on Drugs
Why cook at home when you can get it to go?
07.13.06 | Permalink | Comment?

In what may in the long term be one of the worst cases of “blowback” in the war on drugs in North America it sounds as though methamphetamine use is turning into an even uglier mess than it was already becoming.

In the past year or two federal, state and local governments and their law enforcement agencies, almost nationwide, have made a concerted effort to crack down on and enact legislation in an effort to hamper individuals that traffic in, use and or manufacture (Cook) meth. Most of these tactics have focused on the small time “Cook” (Not to be confused with crook, even though it is still an accurate description) and their lab/kitchens and the hazards these small-scale setups pose to many individuals and the communities in which they live and operate in. The dangers to people and the environment are well documented.
Smuggling
Daisy Angus - Drug Mule Jailed in India
07.13.06 | Permalink | Comment?

26 year old British backpacker, Daisy Angus, has been sentenced in India for attempting to smuggle 10kg of cannabis out of the country.

Angus, of Bournemouth in the UK, received sentencing on June 21, but having already spent 4 years in a Mumbai jail will only be required to serve an additional six years.

Angus, who was 22 at the time, was reportedly apprehended attempting to leave the country with a suitcase that contained the cannabis.
Europe, Smuggling, War on Drugs
Giles Carlyle-Clarke
07.12.06 | Permalink | 1 Comment

Giles Carlyle-Clarke, an Englishman who has been wanted by U.S. authorities ever since his arrest in 1997 on charges of being involved in a £60 million marijuana smuggling operation dating back to the 1980s, has lost his final legal battle against extradition and is being flown over to Alabama.

The 48-year-old, a furniture importer and member of an aristocratic family whose history can be traced all the way back to the Domesday book of 1086, had his case rejected two weeks ago by the European Court of Human Rights after earlier having lost in the High Court. He had claimed it was no coincidence that his deportation was approved only ten days after President Bush’s controversial visit to the UK in late 2003, when the future release of nine British detainees at Guantanamo was discussed. British and US authorities denied the link. A magistrate granted the American request for extradition in January 1999.

Carlyle-Clarke is accused of being part of a deal to smuggle four tonnes of marijuana into the U.S. state of Alabama from Jamaica between 1983-88. US authorities say it took so long in the first place to charge him because they weren’t able to identify or trace him. In response he noted that they already had his address from an affidavit he had signed in 1989 to affirm that he had lent a friend, Robert de Lisser, £20,000 to help fight drug charges; in addition, they had had a photo of him since 1988.
Africa, Smuggling
Claudio dos Santos’ “cunning hiding place”
07.10.06 | Permalink | Comment?

Claudio dos Santos, a 21-year-old student at the University of Namibia, has been charged with smuggling cocaine into the southern African country after 76 packets of human hair inside baggage he was picking up at the international airport were apparently found to contain cocaine. The hair - used as hair extensions - has now been sent off to a lab for analysis.

According to police, the alleged cocaine was probably dissolved and then soaked in the hair before being put in the suitcase. If it had got through customs it would then have been separated from its “cunning hiding place”. They say the luggage Santos was picking up was supposedly excess luggage sent to his mother from the Brazilian city of Sao Paulo, where she had visited a month ago.
Asia, Oceania, Smuggling, The Media
Drug smuggling and the death penalty
07.09.06 | Permalink | Comment?

If drug couriers are likely to face the death penalty if caught and convicted in a foreign country - and their home country doesn’t have capital punishment - should police from their home country still tip off those foreign authorities or just wait until they return home and then arrest them?

This issue, which came up in the case of the Bali Nine, has been raised again in light of the arrest in Vietnam of an Australian couple on charges of attempted heroin smuggling. Vietnamese airport officials alleged Nguyen Van Huy, aged 36, and his 39-year-old wife, Hoang Le Thuy, had 500 grams of heroin hidden away in bottles of medication in their baggage, as they attempted to fly from Ho Chi Minh City back to their hometown of Melbourne. Their three daughters, aged between two and 10, were travelling with them and have been handed over to relatives. They face possible decades away from their parents.
Latin America, People, Smuggling
Brazil: Luciano Geraldo Daniel arrested, Tiago Teixeira evades police
07.07.06 | Permalink | Comment?

Brazilian federal police have arrested Luciano Geraldo Daniel, the man they say is the biggest cocaine supplier in the country, a day after police in Rio De Janeiro stormed two slums in search of Tiago Teixeira, a drug lord who they suspect of ordering the killings of up to 18 people whose bodies have been found scattered all over the city.

Daniel was captured Thursday at his ranch, 215 miles west of Sao Paulo, after police briefly skirmished with four of his men. Chemicals, weapons and 330 pounds of cocaine paste were discovered on his property. Authorities say he smuggles 650 pounds of cocaine paste into Brazil from Bolivia every month thanks to a helicopter owned by colleague Floriano Nolasco da Silva who, along with two of his men, were arrested in Santa Catarina state, further south of Sao Paulo.