Family of 8 held with $.25M ‘coke’

A PRINCES Town family of eight, including three female teenagers was arrested by police during an evening raid last Friday. members of the family were caught busily wrapping and packaging pure cocaine which the officers said carried an estimated street value of $.25 million. The family, who over the weekend was charged with trafficking in cocaine, is expected to answer that the indictable charge this morning before a Princes Town magistrate. According to police reports, the family was caught red-handed dividing  12 kilogrammes of cocaine and wrapping them in foil packages in the gallery of the house. The cocaine was intended to be retailed on the local market, police said.

Officers also arrested a 31-year-old man who was seen leaving the house and who, on being searched, was found with two foil packets of cocaine. police believe he had just purchased the cocaine from the family. He is also expected to appear in court today. Police sources told Newsday the officers involved in the raids also seized a quantity of razor blades, blocks of cocaine and 48 foil packets which  contained cocaine. Each foil packet, sources said, weighed between four and five grammes which would fetch approximately $100 on the local market. The successful bust came on Friday around 5.30 pm at a house in St Julien Village, Princes Town, following weeks of surveillance work by Princes Town police Task Force officers. The team of officers headed by Sgt Errol Ramdath and including PCs Sulliman, Singh, Ali and Samaroo, executed a warrant and allegedly caught the family processing the cocaine. They was taken to the Princes Town police station, along with the seized items. 

Among those arrested were three female teenagers aged 14, 16 and 17 years along with their 40-year-old mother and father who is 47 years old. In addition, three men aged 26, 24 and 22, were also held. This is the latest in a series of police initiatives aimed at cracking several major cocaine cartels in the country. Police sources said this country was a vital trans-shipment point for the export of cocaine and heroin, which originated from the South American mainland, to major markets in the United States and Europe. Sources also said they believe the cocaine seized at the house in Princes Town represented the local “cut” of a larger consignment of the illegal drug, which came into the country destined for the United States.