Drug trafficker jailed for 4 years, fined $1.7M

Nishart Samsundar has been sentenced to four years in prison and fined $1,778,400 for trafficking over two pounds of marijuana.
A resident of Timehri, East Bank Demerara, the 20-year-old Samsundar was on Wednesday arraigned before Diamond/Golden Magistrate Sunil Scarce on charges of growing a prohibited plant and possessing narcotics with the intent to traffic.

He pleaded guilty to both charges, and was sentenced to four years’ imprisonment and fined $1,778,400 for trafficking 1.976 kilograms of cannabis (marijuana); and was jailed for four years for cultivating a prohibiting plant. The two sentences would be served concurrently.
Last Thursday, Customs Anti- Narcotics Unit officers conducting an eradication exercise at Hauraruni Village, off the Soesdyke-Linden Highway, stumbled upon a farm consisting of about 200 cannabis plants ranging from two feet to four feet in height, together with a nursery of about 5,000 cannabis plants.
A search of two camps found on the farm uncovered approximately 100 pounds of cannabis leaves, seeds and stems, and one 12-gauge cartridge. The plants and approximately 100 pounds of cannabis were destroyed.
As a result of this discovery, Samsundar and a 33-year-old woman of Timehri were arrested and escorted to CANU Headquarters, along with the cartridge. (G1)