The pink suitcase with an orange rainbow containing the cocaine was checked in on a Delta Airlines flight on Tuesday by Dorothy Sears who US officials said also had marijuana stuffed in her brassiere.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent, Robert Buonaspina, on Tuesday last Customs and Border Protection officers were conducting a border examination of baggage being offloaded from a Delta Airlines flight 384 which had arrived from Guyana. During the inspection a specially trained dog reacted to the pink suitcase, which was ticketed to Sears and upon investigation it was found to contain 24 kilogrammes of cocaine.
He swore in an affidavit that during a customs examination of Sears’ carry-on luggage she “was nervous, sweating profusely and avoiding eye contact” she was asked if she had any checked luggage and responded in the negative.
“A pat-down search was then conducted of the defendant’s person and a hard object was found concealed in the defendant’s bra. The hard object was found to be a plastic bag containing a green leafy substance,” the ICE agent said in court documents seen by this newspaper. Faced with this discovery, which was later determined to be marijuana, Sears then admitted that she had checked-in the pink suitcase and stated that she had been instructed by an individual in Guyana not to pick up the bag.
She told US authorities that she was to be paid US$6,000 for checking in the suitcase by an individual in Guyana. She said she thought initially the suitcase had marijuana but when she received it she believed it contained cocaine because of the weight and the amount of money she was paid.
Sears was taken into custody and is expected to have a bail hearing before a New York magistrate today.
Meanwhile two days before Sears was busted, January 10, another Guyanese was intercepted attempting to smuggle just over 12 grammes of cocaine into the US.
Rayon Jarvis arrived at the JFK airport aboard Caribbean Airlines flight 522 from Guyana and he presented two suitcases, a black Olympia suitcase and a black Claiborne suitcase, to customs officials for inspection.
Upon inspection both suitcases were found to contain cocaine amounting to 12, 172.7 grams of cocaine.
He told officials that he knew the suitcases had cocaine and that he was paid US$5,000 to take it to the US. Jarvis is in US custody.
Though some couriers are being caught at the airport a number of them are getting through. The failure to detect nearly 50 lbs of cocaine will raise questions again about collusion between personnel at the airport and drug traffickers.
This has been a longstanding problem at the airport despite several layers of security.
