GNIC wharf ganja bust: Dominican jailed for 4 years, fined $14M; 2 others remanded
A national of the Dominican Republic was jailed for four years and six months and fined $14 million over a recent drug bust at the Guyana National Industrial Company Incorporated (GNIC) Wharf located at Lombard Street, Georgetown.
Fredy Diaz Cabrera, 56, of Montrose, East Coast Demerara (ECD); the mother of his child, Epiphany McLennan called “Tiffany” of B Field Sophia, Greater Georgetown, and Eustace Rodrigues called “Fine-Man”, 45, of Albouystown, Georgetown were arraigned on a drug trafficking charge on Friday.
They appeared before Principal Magistrate Sherdel Isaacs-Marcus at the Georgetown Magistrates’ Courts. Cabrera and McLennan were jointly charged with trafficking 16.046 kilograms of marijuana on January 19 at GNIC Wharf.
Cabrera pleaded guilty, while the woman denied the charge.
Rodrigues, on the other hand, pleaded not guilty to trafficking the said quantity of marijuana on January 18 at his Albouystown home. Cabrera, a seaman, claimed that Rodrigues gave him the narcotic to traffic to Barbados.
However, Rodrigues told the court he does not know of the illicit drug. Cabrera told the court that he served time in a United States prison for trafficking cocaine. Rodrigues and McLennan will return to court on February 25.
On January 19, Customs Anti-Narcotics Unit (CANU) ranks conducted a narcotics operation at the GNIC Wharf where they searched a vessel containing a quantity of cement that was scheduled to leave port Georgetown.
The parcels of marijuana that were found on the vessel
Several parcels of suspected cannabis were discovered throughout the vessel. The vessel is foreign-registered, and at the time, had a crew of 19 foreign nationals. The vessel’s crew along with the narcotic were taken to CANU headquarters.
At CANU headquarters, the drug was tested and confirmed to be marijuana – a foreign type known as “creepy”. CANU said the drug which has an estimated value of $14 million would have been valued way more if it had reached its intended destination.
According to CANU, the operation is part of an ongoing multi-agency and multi-national investigation aimed at dismantling a regional network involved in the movement of narcotics from Guyana using cargo vessels. (G1)
