U.S. drug courier gets four years sentence
A UNITED States (U.S.) citizen, who was busted at the Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA) with cocaine in ten pairs of shoes, was sentenced to four years imprisonment yesterday.
In addition, Nakia Marie Slade, 30, of Lot 324 Howard Avenue, Brooklyn, was fined $300,000 after she pleaded guilty, before Magistrate Sueanna Lovell, to trafficking in a narcotic.
The convict admitted that, on October 5, she had two kilogrammes of the drug for the purpose
Customs Anti-Narcotics Unit (CANU) Special Prosecutor Oswald Massiah told the court that Slade came to Guyana on September 22, under the pretence that she was on vacation and was staying at a city hotel.
The prosecutor said the prisoner was returning to her home country when CANU officers noticed something strange in her suitcase when it was scanned and conducted a search of it in her presence.
Massiah said the officers observed the unusual weight of one of the shoes and when it was pierced a whitish substance poured out. Seven pairs of shoes were in the suitcase and three pairs in her handbag, with cocaine valued US$40,000.
The Prosecutor said Slade told the CANU officers she bought the shoes at a store in the city and took them to her hotel from where another person uplifted them and brought them back to her when she was ready to leave Guyana.
Slade told the magistrate she was sorry for what she did and it would never happen again. She added that this was her first trip to Guyana and was told she was coming on a vacation.
The magistrate, before passing sentence, warned Slade that the offence carries five years imprisonment but said she would be lenient as the defendant did not waste the court’s time.
However, the magistrate said she was not convinced by the defendant’s explanation and that she must have known what was going on before she came to Guyana.