tagged w/ Drug Trafficking
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For nearly a decade, naked pumpkin runners did their thing unmolested, stampeding through the frigid dark past crowds of admirers who hooted, hollered and tossed candy. But last year the run attracted more than 150 participants, and Police Chief Mark Beckner fears things are getting out of hand. "It's a free-for-all," he says.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125693458626119361.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_MIDDLENexttoWhatsNewsForthFor nearly a decade, naked pumpkin runners did their thing unmolested, stampeding... more
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In an excerpt from Miami Babylon, Gerald Posner recalls 1980s South Beach, when it was a Wild West of drug cartels and sex parties that made Scarface look tame.In an excerpt from Miami Babylon, Gerald Posner recalls 1980s South Beach, when it was... more
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It has now been eight years since the U.S. invaded Afghanistan with the promise of building a democratic state and liberating women. The invasion has failed on both counts.
Malalai Joya is one of Afghanistan’s leading democracy activists. Joya, the youngest person ever elected to its parliament, was suspended in 2007 for her denunciation of warlords and their cronies in government.
“Rather than democracy, what we have in Afghanistan are backroom deals among discredited warlords who are sworn enemies of democracy and justice,” she writes on her website.
Joya became an international figure in 2003 after she fearlessly confronted the Grand Council of tribal leaders in a constitutional assembly.
“Why would you allow criminals to be present at this Loya Jirga?” she said. “They are warlords responsible for our country’s situation. They oppress women and have ruined our country. They should be prosecuted.”
The Progressive had the opportunity to interview Joya for our radio show back in 2006. Her quiet resolve in the face of death threats touched us deeply.
We profiled her courage in a June 2007 article by Matt Pascarella, “The Bravest Woman in Afghanistan.”
Here’s an excerpt:
“Ironically, Joya’s mission to take on the warlords and the drug lords, to promote democracy and women’s rights, appears to echo the rhetoric of the Bush Administration. And yet, according to Joya, rather than live up to that rhetoric, the U.S. government is actively supporting high-ranking officials who have been accused of corruption, drug trafficking, and war crimes, including mass murders. Several of these are in the cabinet of Hamid Karzai.”
Joya let us publish an adaption of her speech she gave at the Global Forum on Freedom of Expression, held in Oslo, Norway, June 1-6, 2009.
She predicted that the Afghan elections, held in August, would be a joke.
“Afghanistan has a presidential election scheduled soon, but everyone knows that the election is a show that is throwing dust in the eyes of our people. The actual choice is with the White House to select its next puppet in Afghanistan and give him legitimacy through this show,” she said two months before the fraudulent elections.
“But we Afghans know that despite international condemnation by human rights organizations and protests by Afghan people, Karzai will be the next president with the two criminals as his vice presidents.”
President Barack Obama, who ran on an anti-Iraq War platform, needs to stop this war, too. He needs to listen to people such as Joya.
“It is due to the wrong and devastating policies of the U.S. government and NATO countries,” she said, “that unfortunately today Afghanistan is a mafia state and ranked at the top of the most unstable and corrupt countries in the world.”It has now been eight years since the U.S. invaded Afghanistan with the promise of... more
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Really disturbing story from Guinea this morning as reports are filtering out of the West African nation’s capital about soldiers killing pro-democracy demonstrators in the streets. Its estimated that as many as 157 people have died and the AP reports that soldiers, smelling of alcohol, were witnessed even raping protestors.
From the Washington Post:
"An Associated Press reporter said he saw halls full of wounded patients at the city’s large Donka Hospital, some with bullet wounds, others who appeared to have been beaten. Opposition politician Mutarr Diallo said he witnessed soldiers raping women with rifle butts during Monday’s protests. He was arrested during the protest but released Tuesday morning. New York-based Human Rights Watch said eyewitnesses also told them that security forces had stripped female protesters Monday and raped them in the streets. Other eyewitnesses said soldiers had stabbed protesters with knives and bayonets."
Guinea has been in trouble for decades. Ever since declaring independence from France, it has been cursed with a series of corrupt administrations focused more on getting themselves rich than bringing stability and prosperity. This corruption and lack of stable law enforcement has made Guinea (and other nations in West Africa) a prime location for drug trafficking into Western Europe. (Our new season of Vanguard will include a story on this by Christof Putzel, actually). At the end of last year, the military took control of the country in a coup. This is the government pro-democracy protestors were hoping to get rid of. So it’s even more chilling that soldiers, directly part of the ruling military body could inflict such damage.
Military leader Capt. Moussa “Dadis” Camara told Radio France International: “Those people who committed those atrocities were uncontrollable elements in the military….Even I, as head of state in this very tense situation, cannot claim to be able to control those elements in the military.”
Well that’s not very reassuring.
We’ll have more updates on this story for you during the day – and video later on in the afternoon.Really disturbing story from Guinea this morning as reports are filtering out of the... more
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According to a new report, NATO forces in Afghanistan are increasingly reliant on illegal militias, often run by warlords responsible for human rights abuses and drug trafficking.According to a new report, NATO forces in Afghanistan are increasingly reliant on... more
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Pat Rozinski Associated Press New York September 16, 2009: I received a call from my boss in Atlanta late this evening about 9:05 pm, rapper, independent filmmaker and CEO of Hoodwatch Media Corp Lord Hector Diono. The news was long overdue and unexpected; Lord Hector confirmed the return of his Godfather, former mentor to the late Notorious B.I.G., Mr. Darnell "Big D" Johnson from Augusta State Medical prison. Hector said "the conversation was surreal I haven't spoken to him on a phone in three years!" Hector also confirmed that Mr. Johnson’s spirit was upbeat and a formal sit-down is being scheduled by the elders to discuss the current issues involving the rapper and any woes or concerns that may need to be addressed immediately. Lord Hector Diono spoke of his Godfather often and also mentions him in his latest interview involving the unsolved murder of the Brooklyn rapper Christopher "Biggie Smalls" Wallace we will keep you posted as this breaking story develops. By Pat Rozinski Associated Press New York September 16, 2009Pat Rozinski Associated Press New York September 16, 2009: I received a call from my... more
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Drug traffickers are planting millions of marijuana plants on U.S. public lands ever closer to tourist sites, guarding their plots with heavy weaponry, federal authorities say.
"We destroy their plants and they come back, sometimes to the same spot, and replant," said U.S. Forest Service Special Agent Russ Arthur.
"It's definitely possible that hikers and campers are going to find themselves in the middle of a field facing some very dangerous, armed bad guys, because this problem is everywhere, and it's only getting worse."
Across the nation, pot sites linked to cartels have been found in 15 states as far north as Washington, Arthur said.
Last week, a portion of Sequoia National Park in the Sierra Nevada was closed to visitors while rangers dropped from helicopters into a marijuana farm a half-mile away from Crystal Cave, popular among tourists.
Officials said there were five sites in the Yucca Creek Canyon where investigators recovered tons of trash, netting, chemicals and camping materials, a discovery that suggested the growers had been there, or planned to stay, for a long time.
Though authorities destroyed the patch, whoever wanted to profit probably got what they wanted. Seventy-five percent of the plants had been harvested, said park spokeswoman Adrienne Freeman.
"Last week for six days, instead of having families and children walking down to Crystal Cave, we were flying helicopters to do a law enforcement operation," she said. "That's not fair. You should be able to come to the park and enjoy it."
Freeman cautioned that there is a steep cliff near the site and most visitors wouldn't be skilled enough to trek into the area.
But some might. In Idaho earlier this summer, hikers came upon 12,545 marijuana plants valued at $6.3 million, officials said.
This week, the Forest Service was working to eradicate plants at Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore, beloved by fishermen, where one year ago the agency brought out six dump trucks full of marijuana -- 10,000 plants -- valued at $8.5 million, according to chief ranger Mike Bremer.
And on Friday, the Drug Enforcement Administration said it had found 14,500 marijuana plants growing in a patch of forest land 40 miles southwest of Denver, Colorado, where campers have ventured.
The Forest Service has stepped up its efforts to raid forest areas in Georgia and Tennessee, including areas near the Chattahoochee River, a favorite among hikers, campers and adventure racers. The agency has started podcasting and posting signs on public land, trying to describe to regular folks what a pot field looks like and how to get away from it quickly.
Though traffickers have been planting on public lands for years, figures from the U.S. Forest Service indicate the sheer volume of marijuana plants on public land has increased every year since 2005 -- by millions. And those are just the plants that the government knows about and has destroyed.
Most pot farms are cultivated by low-level cartel workers, many who are working to pay off smugglers who helped them cross the border, officials have said. Campsites are sophisticated and well hidden, with foxholes and sniper nests, Arthur told CNN.
The workers plant four to five farms at a time to get one bountiful crop, reckoning that two might be destroyed by law enforcement, one might fail because of weather, and another could be pilfered by what officers call "pot pirates," Americans who risk getting close to traffickers to score free pot, Arthur said.
Dean Growdon, an assistant sheriff and commander of the Lassen County, California, Narcotics Task Force, said he's especially concerned about pot farm violence now because hunting season is about to start.
"We get more reports this time of year from hunters who've stumbled onto sites," he said. "We had a guy who discovered they were growing on the back portion of his property."
Click link for more...Drug traffickers are planting millions of marijuana plants on U.S. public lands ever... more
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xiola
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3 months ago
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By Erik Larson
Aug 8, 2009, Sibel Edmonds gave a sworn deposition in which she testified to her knowledge of treasonous crimes and corruption involving current and former members of Congress and State and Defense Dept. officials. Given the nature of the deposition, the lines of questioning focused on Turkish espionage and services obtained through bribery and blackmail by Turkish officials and proxies. However, Edmonds has previously disclosed that the corruption involving U.S. officials also includes money laundering, trafficking in drugs, arms and nuclear secrets, U.S. support for Bin Laden/Al Qaeda, and obstruction of FBI investigations related to 9/11, before and after the attacks; she said these things came up “briefly” during the deposition. Edmonds learned of these things from wiretaps she listened to while working as a translator for the FBI in 2001-2002.
Video coverage from VelvetRevolution.us and BradBlog.com
Edmonds' Aug 8 testimony was subpoenaed by David Krikorian (Democratic 2010 Congressional candidate- OH) to support his defense against a lawsuit brought by Jean Schmidt, R-OH. Krikorian had circulated a flier in his 2008 campaign in which he alleged that Schmidt had accepted “blood money” from Turkish interests in exchange for opposing a Congressional resolution acknowledging the Turkish genocide of Armenians in World War I. The deposition took place in Washington, DC at the headquarters of the National Whistleblower Center
After the deposition, Edmonds took questions, and spoke in general terms about the deposition subjects (video, 13:25):
Larson- “Were you able to talk about any of the stuff that you’ve said about 9/11 in the past- did any of that come up?”
Edmonds- “We talked very briefly on Central Asia angle and 9/11 and the Mujahideen and Al Qaeda…and the role played by certain Turkish entities, so we talked briefly about that, yes, but mainly on the corruption U.S. persons, even in relation to those activities…it came up briefly.”
Larson- “How about the stuff about nuclear trafficking, drug smuggling, arms trafficking?”
Edmonds- “Yes, it came up- not in detail- Mr. Grossman’s name came up and Brewster-Jennings- I believe this is gonna be for the first time under Oath, on the record, people getting answer on Brewster-Jennings and the real story- not the crap that they got from the media.”
It seems that while a great deal of new information came out in this deposition that will justify criminal investigations and widespread media coverage, Edmonds was witness to a great deal more that remains to be disclosed and properly investigated.
Former Attorney General John Ashcroft had invoked the State Secrets privilege in 2002 to quash Sibel Edmonds’ lawsuit against the DOJ for suppression of her Right to speak freely about the crimes and corruption she had witnessed. He invoked the State Secrets privilege again in 2004 to prevent her from testifying in a case brought by family members of 9/11 victims, classified her date of birth and also retroactively classified letters from Sens. Grassley and Leahy that had been public for nearly 2 years (this was later overturned, when POGO, who had published the letters, sued the DOJ). The DOJ attempted to dissuade Edmonds testifying this time as well, but did not re-invoke the State Secrets privilege and did not appear at the deposition.
No so-called “mainstream” print or broadcast media showed up to cover the deposition. Too bad for them, as Edmonds’ allegations reportedly include a juicy sex scandal involving a current Democratic Congresswoman- exactly the kind of thing the mainstream media loves to cover in depth ad nauseum. Given that these allegations intersect with allegations of treasonous activities by high-level figures in the Democrat and Republican establishment, it seems unlikely the corporate media will report on this, even when the video and transcript are made public.
One mainstream media outlet did acknowledge that the deposition cont'dBy Erik Larson
Aug 8, 2009, Sibel Edmonds gave a sworn deposition in which she... more
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mae37
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3 months ago
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Spanish police have found 107 buttons stuffed with cocaine and have detained one suspect. The buttons were shipped from Britain to a resort town on Spain's Mediterranean coast. Funnily enough, Roquetas de Mar just so happens to be popular with British tourists.
Personally, I don't like the look of these buttons, they don't look all that appetising compared to Milkybar Buttons - although I bet they're more moreish...
(Sadly I couldn't find a Milkybar Buttons advert on YouTube, so you're left with a pic of the coke buttons instead)Spanish police have found 107 buttons stuffed with cocaine and have detained one... more
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There's a new drug war brewing along the U.S. borders -- but this time it's coming from up north. As Mexico cracks down on its warring drug factions, dealers in Canada are battling each other for market share and dominance. Since March, drug-related violence has escalated, infiltrating towns and communities with little or no connection to drug dealers or gangs. According to the Los Angeles Times, drug dealers are sparing no one --" gunning down women (one in a car with her 4-year-old son in the back seat), high school students with no gang allegiances and, especially, one another, in broad daylight in and around the city that will host the 2010 Winter Olympics." What's driving the killings? Authorities told the LA Times it's a reflection of tougher enforcement in Mexico.
Authorities trace the violence to the recent government crackdown on cocaine traffickers in Mexico, which has squeezed profit margins for cocaine north of the U.S. border. Canada's outlaw retailers are fighting to the death over market share, police say, a situation exacerbated by personal vendettas and power vacuums left by the arrests of gang leaders.
"The war in Mexico directly impacts on the drug trade in Canada. . . . There's a complete disruption of the flow of cocaine into Canada, and we are seeing the result," said Pat Fogarty, operations officer for the Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit, British Columbia's main law enforcement agency targeting organized crime.
British Columbia has emerged as the new power player in the drug market, specializing in its "powerful" homegrown marijuana, better known as "B.C. Bud." The LA Times reports Canada's dealers are employing various techniques and devices to avoid police detection, such as
planes, helicopters, drug-sniffing dogs, X-rays and, in one case, a tunnel to move drugs.There's a new drug war brewing along the U.S. borders -- but this time it's coming... more
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Russian officials publicly blame America for the plague because almost all the heroin comes from U.S.-dominated Afghanistan, but they won't discuss in detail how drugs move through their country. They've yet to devise a comprehensive plan to address the issue. Trials of high-level traffickers are conducted in secret. Even midlevel police officials usually don't talk, and when they do, it's privately and away from their workplaces.
'THE AMERICANS HAVE DONE NOTHING'
Chelyabinsk, a city of more than 1 million in southwest Russia, once was known as Tankograd — "tank city" — for its World War II production of T-34 tanks. It later gained notoriety as the center of a region swamped by radioactive waste from a nearby nuclear-weapons facility.
A different poison is spreading today: Chelyabinsk has become a major transshipment center for Afghan opium and heroin, which enters Russia from Central Asia.
The drugs usually reach Russia from Tajikistan and Kazakhstan in trucks or, in smaller amounts, tucked away in train compartments or nervous travelers' stomachs.
The trade is nothing new in Russia, but after the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, it exploded. Afghan opium production climbed from 3,400 metric tons in 2002 to a record 8,200 metric tons in 2007, partly because U.S. and NATO-led troops put a low priority on curbing it. Heroin flooded into Central Asia, and on to Russia.
"When I heard the Americans were going to enter Afghanistan I thought they were going to solve the problem, to stop the drugs," said Yevgeny Roizman, who had connections with Russian organized crime before he became a member of parliament. He now runs an anti-drug organization in the city of Yekaterinburg, another big heroin-distribution hub north of Chelyabinsk.
"But in the period after they came, there was a big increase in the region . . . ," Roizman added. "It makes me think the Americans have done nothing to stop the drug trafficking."
Although it's an unintended consequence of the U.S. action in Afghanistan, some Russian officials trace the growing problem to an American plot.Russian officials publicly blame America for the plague because almost all the heroin... more
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Is there any company that isn't soiled by corruption and greed? We're talking about a BANANA company here. Knowingly and admittedly paying off terrorist organizations to maintain control of the area as the only banana growers? And then stating you aren't part of what they do? How is that possible? Unbelievable.Is there any company that isn't soiled by corruption and greed? We're talking about a... more
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A remarkable film in which we follow the Kazakh police as they carry out a raid heroin smugglers and follow the fate of one of the young impoverished men they catch as he is sentenced and imprisoned for his crime. With full access to the police, judiciary and prison systems this pod looks at what drives these young men to become drug mules and what it's like to suddenly find yourself locked up, possibly for life.A remarkable film in which we follow the Kazakh police as they carry out a raid heroin... more
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Ruthless drug cartels in Mexico are battling against each other and against the government for control of the drug trade. 2008 was the most violent year in Mexico, with around 6,000 drug-related murders. 2009 looks like it could be even worse. And there are fears that Mexico's narco-violence could spread north of the border into the U.S. In this one-hour Vanguard report, Laura Ling travels to the border towns of Juarez and Tijuana, Mexico where drugs gangs are fighting for control of the drug routes into the United States. Ling also goes to the city of Culiacan in Sinaloa State, a region that's known as the birthplace of narco-trafficking in Mexico. Despite the 40,000 federal troops that are patrolling cities across Mexico, violence is increasing and the methods of killings are becoming even more brazen and grotesque. Ling speaks with gun dealers in El Paso, Texas and U.S. officials about the illegal smuggling of weapons into Mexico--90% of the weapons seized in Mexico have been traced back to the U.S. She examines the culture of corruption and lack of public trust in a police force that has become known for working with the cartels.
Vanguard is Current TV's award-winning documentary series. Whether it's half a world away or in our own backyard, Vanguard goes there to bring you stories about the most important issues of our time. Led by reporters Laura Ling, Christof Putzel, Mariana van Zeller, Adam Yamaguchi and Kaj Larsen, Vanguard airs on Wednesday at 10 pm Eastern and Pacific and can be found online at current.com/vanguard.Ruthless drug cartels in Mexico are battling against each other and against the... more
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"A gardener detained along with more than a dozen members of an alleged drug trafficking ring testified that police threatened him to feed him to lions and tigers during a raid at a Mexico City mansion, a newspaper reported Friday.
The Oct. 16 raid — in which police seized exotic animals from a private zoo at a sprawling estate — has been marred by allegations of abuse and corruption against the police who conducted the operation.
Mexico's former acting federal police chief, Gerardo Garay, is under investigation for allegedly stealing money from the mansion during the raid. Garay is among several federal officers arrested for alleged collaboration with drug cartels in a corruption investigation known as "Operation Clean House."
The Reforma newspaper says it had access to a court hearing Tuesday in which the gardener, Fernando Maya, testified that police beat him, gave him electric shocks and threatened to rape his wife if he did not reveal the whereabouts of the owner of the house, who remains at large. He claimed that police dragged him to cages with lions and tigers and threatened to throw him inside.
"They kept saying, where is he? And that they were going to throw me to the lions, they were going to throw me to the tigers, which had not eaten," the newspaper quoted Maya as saying. "I told them they should just kill me."
Maya also claimed that a police commander tried to goad a monkey into scratching him, but the animal ended up swiping the officer instead ..."
Don't mess with monkeys man, they'll get ya ..."A gardener detained along with more than a dozen members of an alleged drug... more
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"Mexican President Felipe Calderon hailed eight soldiers who were decapitated in Guerrero state as heroes who died at the hands of criminals growing increasingly desperate amid his government’s crackdown on drug cartels.
The heads of eight soldiers and a former police chief were found Dec. 20 in a plastic bag in Guerrero’s capital of Chilpancingo on Dec. 20, El Universal reported. An unsigned message attached to the bag said 10 more soldiers would be killed for “each of us that is killed,” the newspaper reported.
“They are capable of committing any barbarous act,” Calderon said today, according to a transcript of his speech sent by e-mail. “Organized crime, filled with panic, has turned to all kinds of cowardly acts.”
Calderon has sent thousands of troops to battle drug traffickers that have killed more than 5,300 people this year as they fight for larger pieces of the $14.8 billion trade in marijuana, cocaine, heroin and amphetamines bound for the US."
By Andres R. Martinez
To contact the reporter on this story: Andres R. Martinez in Mexico City at amartinez28@bloomberg.net"Mexican President Felipe Calderon hailed eight soldiers who were decapitated in... more
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Traffickers hid 2.8 tons of cocaine in thousands of pounds of smelly bird droppings, Peruvian police said on Monday after uncovering the latest ruse to conceal drug shipments.
Cocaine exporters in Peru, the worlds No. 2 producer after neighboring Colombia, counted on the stench of the dung, which is sold as a high-end organic fertilizer, tricking dogs trained to find drugs at ports of entry.
Guano accumulates as white mounds on the desert islands where birds such as pelicans live along the coasts of Peru and Chile.
It was once one of the worlds most valuable commodities, and Bolivia, Peru and Chile fought over its control in the 1879-1883 War of the Pacific.Traffickers hid 2.8 tons of cocaine in thousands of pounds of smelly bird droppings,... more
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Enrique Portocarrero hardly seems a dashing character out of a Jules Verne science fiction novel. But law enforcement officers here have dubbed him "Captain Nemo," after the dark genius of "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea." They say the 45-year-old has designed and built as many as 20 fiberglass submarines, strange vessels with the look of sea creatures, for drug traffickers to haul cocaine from this area of southern Colombia to Central America and Mexico.
Portocarrero's craft are difficult for counter-narcotics officials to detect on the open seas because their tiny wake creates a negligible radar "footprint." Also, authorities say, the exhaust is released through tubing below the surface, frustrating patrol aircraft's heat-sensing equipment.
"He had a marvelous criminal vision," Colombian navy Capt. Luis German Borrero said. "He introduced innovations such as a bow that produced very little wake, a conning tower that rises only a foot above the water and a valve system that enables the crew to scuttle the sub in 10 minutes. He is very ingenious."Enrique Portocarrero hardly seems a dashing character out of a Jules Verne science... more
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Tashi
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Atia Ashraf, 24, tried to smuggle £18,000 of drugs into a prison in her knickers was stopped by police at Armley Prison, Leeds, in April on her way to visit an inmate.
A search found 13.2g of heroin, 6.63g of crack cocaine and 0.5g of cannabis, in a sausage shaped package hidden in the elastic of her pants.
Ashraf was found guilty last month of possession of class A and class C drugs with intent to supply. She has been jailed for four years. Sentencing Ashraf, jail for four years was the shortest possible sentence the judge could give her in order to dissuade other people minded to do what she tried to do.Atia Ashraf, 24, tried to smuggle £18,000 of drugs into a prison in her knickers was... more
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afridi
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12 months ago
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There is a veritable civil war going on in Mexico, and I bet you didn't know that. Neither did I until recently. Cartels are effectively fighting the Mexican government and its police force. Now, journalists who report on the literally thousands of drug related murders and deaths in general are being targeted by narco traffickers.
Our government's idea for help is to supply more guns and money to the government. We as citizens are not helping the matter either. The US is the largest consumer of narcotics in the world per capita. This is scary stuff.There is a veritable civil war going on in Mexico, and I bet you didn't know that.... more
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