A joint Air and Coast Guard exercise in Icacos on Thursday afternoon resulted in the seizure of over $1.3 million in high-grade marijuana.
Police said shortly after noon, an Air Guard helicopter noticed a suspicious-looking fishing vessel in the waters off an isolated beach in Icacos.
By the time Coast Guard interceptors were dispatched and arrived in the area, they found several crocus bags of marijuana floating in the area where the pirogue had been spotted.
The packages of illegal drugs, originating from South America, were fished out of the water, transported to the Coast Guard’s base in south Trinidad, and handed over to police officers from the Organised Crime, Narcotics and Firearms Bureau.
An unsuccessful search for the vessel and its three occupants was made. Investigators believe the smugglers noticed the helicopter and dumped their cargo to lighten their boat in order to effect a speedy escape.
However, law enforcement officers have a description of the boat and its occupants and say arrests are imminent.
Police said the drugs, weighing a total of 114 kilos with a street value of $1,374,840, will be stored for several months and will be destroyed if no one is eventually arrested.
Two guns found in Port-of-Spain
Two illegal guns and a quantity of ammunition were found by police in an anti-crime exercise in Port-of-Spain on Thursday.
However, no one was arrested as the guns and ammunition were found hidden in empty lots of land in Belmont and Laventille.
Police said around 11 am, officers of the Inter-Agency Task Force led by Sgts Ramkalawan and Charles Budrie got information that a gun was hidden at a lot at Joseph Trace, Upper Belmont Valley Road, Belmont. They went to the location and found a 9 mm pistol and 13 rounds of ammunition.
Several hours later, the same group of officers went to Plaisance Road, John John, Laventille, where they used metal detectors to search an empty lot adjacent to the Tokyo Steel Orchestra panyard.
A .357 magnum revolver and 12 rounds of ammunition were found buried under a pile of rubble.
“With this new bail legislation more gang members will be storing guns at these kinds of locations. They know they can’t get charged if it’s in an abandoned place,” a police source said yesterday, as he referred to the Bail (Amendment) Act of 2015 which denies bail for 120 days to persons accused of gun possession and firearm-related crimes.
Both guns were taken to the Forensic Science Centre in St James where ballistic testing will be done to determine if they were used in recent shootings and murders.
Senior Supt Wayne Boyd supervised the exercise.