Georgetown: Guyanese Heeralall Sukdeo was denied bail when he appeared in Brooklyn Federal Court on Tuesday charged with allegedly smuggling 268 kilos of cocaine stuffed in shrimp last week into New York.
Magistrate Lois Bloom refused bail to the Guyanese on the ground that Sukdeo posed a flight risk. Heeralall Sukdeo, the owner of Sukdeo and Sons Fishing Establishment in Queens, New York, USA, was arrested following the discovery of more than 268 kilograms (kg) of cocaine hidden among frozen shrimp shipped from Guyana.
In a US Daily News report, it was stated that the shipment of cocaine was addressed to “Randolph Fraser” which is apparently Sukdeo’s alias. Sukdeo was held without bail as the authorities continue their investigation. According to reports, a drug-sniffing dog detected the drug in a shipping container that arrived at the Red Hook Terminal from Guyana last week. The street value of the cocaine discovered is estimated to be more than US$12 million.
Upon discovering the drugs, agents secretly removed the coke-filled shrimp and tailed the container after it cleared customs on June 15, US Homeland Security Special Agent Ryan Varrone reported. The container was delivered last Monday to an unidentified warehouse in Brooklyn where agents spotted Sukdeo together with others, organising and supervising the unloading of the shipment of shrimp. Sukdeo, 59, was arrested, but reportedly declared his innocence claiming that he was present in the vicinity of the truck containing the shipment, because he was curious about its contents. It was reported that Defence Attorney Andre Travieso said Sukdeo has never been arrested before and was confident that it was a huge mistake. Sukdeo was arrested less than a week after a shipping container arrived at a Red Hook Terminal in Brooklyn where he rents warehouse space, and agents spotted him “together with others… organising and supervising the unloading” of the shipment. Sukdeo operates a fish processing plant at Lusignan and is said to receive the shipments himself in New York.
Reports disclosed that the cocaine was detected ever since it left Guyana for the United States and they would have contacted US drug agents who began to monitor the container as it reached there with the aim of busting the persons involved. The official said that when a shipment of that amount of cocaine is exported, it means that a ring of persons is involved, hence the collusion with the US authorities to track the container. The container was indeed addressed to Rudolph Fraser in Brooklyn, New York; the official added but the shipper is unknown. Reports reveal Heeralall Sukdeo who was arrested in Queens, NY would have been in Guyana when the consignment of shrimp left for the US. He reportedly left Guyana a few days ago and it was upon his return to the US that he was arrested after he was seen supervising and organising the offloading of the crustaceans that were packed in crates.
Officials believes that Sukdeo knew that the container with the shrimp contained the drug and would have stayed back in Guyana until it was cleared by customs officials. “Once the container was given the green light here, the US agents started their operations and would have also paved the way for the container to be cleared there as well”, the official added.
It is presumed that after Sukdeo would have been contacted by his colleagues informing him that the container was cleared by US authorities, he travelled back, the drug enforcement officer stated.
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