By Glenroy Sinclair, Staff ReporterCOCAINE, WITH an estimated street value of US$2.9 million ($160 million), and a 40-foot go-fast boat, were seized in a week-long operation which ended in Alligator Pond, south Manchester, yesterday afternoon, the police say.
Eight persons were arrested during the operation but were not linked directly to the seizures.
The operation was conducted by members of the Jamaica Defence Force Air Wing, narcotics detectives and the Manchester police.
But the police say that despite the seizure of the 119 kilogrammes of cocaine, they believe the smugglers escaped with a significant amount of the consignment.
Det. Senior Supt. Carl Williams, head of the Police Narcotics Division, told The Gleaner that the operation began last Thursday week following intelligence reports that a go-fast boat with a shipment of cocaine had arrived in Jamaican waters from Colombia, bound for Alligator Pond.
In pursuit of the consignment, the lawmen seized five bales of cocaine weighing 119 kilogrammes. The police said they found the first three bales between last week Thursday night and Friday morning on the beach front.
As the operation continued into Friday afternoon, two more bales were found, this time across the road, from where the three bales were found earlier. Up to yesterday when the operation was called off, the police were yet to find the go-fast boat which had transported the drug to Jamaica.
It was also reported that a go-fast boat was spotted by the JDF Air Wing travelling toward Negril. It was chased and later found abandoned in mangroves near Negril, the police say, but nothing was found aboard.
"The drug is believed to be owned by a group of Jamaicans who have Colombian connections," said SSP Williams.
According to Supt. Gladstone Wright, also of the Narcotics Division, during the sustained operation, several foreign nationals were arrested, but they were not tied directly to the cocaine.
Among those arrested was a Honduran national, Alphanso Patuca Rio, who was fined $10,000 or 30 days' imprisonment when he appeared in the Mandeville Resident Magistrate's Court yesterday on charges of illegal entry into the island. He was ordered deported.
