Five Venezuelans who claim they were kidnapped and forced to ingest over 300 cocaine pellets valued at EC$143,407.80 will serve sentences of seven and eight years, respectively, at the Dominica State Prison, after they pleaded guilty to charges of drug trafficking and the importation of cocaine, in addition to false customs declarations.
Yhorbby Jose Rosario age 27, Daike Jose Herrera Ramirez,19, Daniel Jose Rivas Herrera, 23, 33-year-old Hector Luis Ramirez, and Pedro Celestino Flores Ramos, both 37, made their first court appearance before Chief Magistrate Candia Carrette-George on August 25, 2023, where they elected a summary trial at the Roseau Magistrate Court.
Subsequent to the charges being read to the accused men through the assistance of an interpreter, they were remanded into custody awaiting facts and sentencing which was scheduled for August 28, 2023. At their reappearance in Court, the men were taken before Magistrate Gloria Augustus where the facts of the case were presented by Police Prosecutor Inspector David Andrew Jr.
Facts
The five men were transported to the Dominica China Friendship Hospital (DCFH) where they were medically examined and a number of pellets were seen, via x-ray, in their stomach and intestines. They were then admitted to the Alford Ward and whilst there, they each expelled several non-alimentary objects from their anus, as follows: Yhorbby, 84 pellets which weighed 1,038.4 grams, Daike 70 pellets, which weighed 872.8 grams, Daniel 1,135.1 grams equated to 77 pellets, Hector 100 pellets which weighed 1,467.9 grams, and Pedro 55 pellets which were 797.2 grams, all to a total of 386 pellets and 5,311.4 grams of cocaine.
On August 22, 2023, Daike, Hector, and Yhorbby were discharged from the hospital whilst Daniel and Pedro were released the following day. They were all taken to the drug squad unit and questioned about the pellets excreted.
During the investigation, Police Constable Balthazar took samples from the contents within the pellets expelled by the men and took them to the government analyst for testing. They all returned positive for cocaine. During the investigation, both customs and the police conducted interviews with the men. At the conclusion of the investigation, police charges of drug trafficking and importation of cocaine in addition to customs charges of false declaration were preferred against the men.
Sentencing
Unrepresented at their court hearing, the men told Magistrate Augustus that they were all employed in Brazil when they were kidnapped by eight individuals who forced them to ingest the cocaine pellets. According to the Venezuelans, they were en route to Santo Domingo and only intended to spend one night in Dominica. The men stated in the process of forcibly swallowing the cocaine pellets, their lives and that of their families were threatened. They pleaded to be deported back to Venezuela.
The maximum penalty for drug trafficking and importation is$150,000.00 or three times the street value or a term of imprisonment not exceeding 15 years but not less than seven years. Magistrate Augustus said the court was inclined to impose a fine of $75,000.00 against Hector, $60,000.00 against Daniel, $50,000.00 against Yhorbby, $45,000.00 against Daike, and $40,000.00 against Pedro on the police charges.
However, the men informed the court that they were unable to pay the said fine, and a term of imprisonment was instead imposed. Hector, Daniel, and Yhorbby were each sentenced to eight years imprisonment whilst Pedro and Daike were sentenced to seven years.
On the customs charge of false declaration, which will run concurrent to the police sentence, Hector, Daniel, and Yhorbby were each sentenced to five years imprisonment whilst Pedro and Daike were sentenced to four years.
Police Prosecutor, Sergeant Andrew Jr. then made an application to court to have the men removed from Dominica at the end of their prison sentence pursuant to section 23 of the Immigration Act, which was granted by Magistrate Augustus.
On the same day, five other Venezuelans namely Wilber Jesus Delpretty Oliveros, Jose Del Carmen Serrada Carreno, Emerson Ricardo Machado Campos, Luis Alfredo Machado Campos, and Yofra Alexander Martinez all pleaded guilty to drug trafficking and importation of ingested cocaine in addition to the false declaration of customs duty.
They will return to court on August 29, 2023, for facts and sentencing by Magistrate Michael Laudat.
I commend the Customs on this win. This is so risky, how do they know that they would not get the urge before reaching their final destination?
Looks like drugs Carry more time man getting pop with hun 2 years grown men molesting children 6 years grams of drugs them man get caught with 7-8 years come on Dominica open ur eyes
On August 20, 2023, at about 5:50 p.m., the Venezuelans who arrived at the Douglas Charles Airport filled out declaration forms and were subsequently intercepted by Customs Officer Dane Taylor on suspicion of transporting cocaine by ingestion.
My question is what was suspicious ? If was in their stomachs, what about them was suspicious of transporting coke? not adding up at all. Dane knew before hand.
Do you want to know more. That should be enough for you let the customs and police do their work. that was a very good job.
I asked myself that same question. Maybe Dane is an expert is this area
I think the customs officers should put out ALL information on how they detect suspicious culprits. What do you think? You people want to blame the officers for doing their work. This is pathetic. Well done Customs,keep it up.
Simple they got tipped of and were probably suspicious one night in Dominica raises some flags, and the custom officials probably asked questions. Dominica is a known transit point for drugs.
Congratulations to our customs officers for intercepting the drugs..not sure how they could tell that dem man had drugs inside them but most likely they have special training that we don’t know about..
But I do feel bad for dem Venezuelans (if their story is true). It’s impossible that their families really were/are in danger. And, according to them, they were “in transit to Santo Domingo”..
Sadly, we’ll never know the truth of the whole situation.
But maybe it’s best that we (the Dominican “government”) should just deport them now to their country instead of spending 7-8 years of hard-working tax payers money to “house and feed them” and THEN deport them.
They could spend their sentence in their own country..after all, we do have a “special relationship” with Venezuela..
I myself thinking same thing. How customs officer suspicious of digestion. That’s a sell it they know them man was coming. Send them man back to their country. We don’t have money to feed our own is more man to feed in prison we taking on. Stupes.
Ignorance is bliss. You never had customs training but here you are speculating. Most of us never had customs training but did it ever occur to you that there is something they look for that we dont know? Common sense is rare.