Judge reduces bail in cocaine case

A HIGH Court judge yesterday reduced the bail of an accused drug trafficker from $5 million to $500,000 to be approved by the Registrar of the court. Sitting in the Port-of-Spain First Criminal Court, Justice Herbert Volney granted the application for a reduction in bail by Ronald Rackal. Rackal and four others,  Jitram Sookdeo, Hafeez Mohammed, Ramesh Doon, and Indaryartee Dwarika were scheduled to go on trial before Volney on November 1 with Andre Ravi Persad for trafficking 542 kilos of cocaine at Orange Field Road, Freeport on January 22, 2001.  

They were arrested by members of the Organised Crime and Narcotics Unit (OCNU) on a provisional warrant for extradition to the United States to face drug trafficking charges. They had each been placed on $100,000 bail for the local charges when they appeared before Volney on November 1. However, when they appeared before Chief Magistrate Sherman McNicolls at the city’s Magistrates’ Court on that same day for the extradition matter, they were each granted bail in the sum of $5 million — the highest bail in the history of Trinidad and Tobago.