Jamaica: High-ranking police, soldiers targeted in expanding cocaine investigation
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Jamaica pinned on a map by TARIK KIZILKAYA from Getty Images Signature via Canva
KINGSTON, Jamaica, Aug. CMC – Nearly a dozen high-ranking police officers and soldiers are being investigated as part of a widening narcotics probe stemming from the discovery of cocaine at a police storage facility in January.
The investigation is examining whether law-enforcement personnel significantly under-reported the quantity of cocaine seized during an earlier operation in western Jamaica.
The case came to light in January when two “illegal” parcels of cocaine were discovered inside a storage facility at the now-disbanded Counter Terrorism and Organised Crime Division (C-TOC). The Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) disclosed the discovery following an internal audit.
The incident prompted an immediate high-level investigation. Weeks later, Police Commissioner Dr Kevin Blake dismantled C-TOC, transferring more than 40 police officers assigned to the division to other units.
The investigation became public on Wednesday when agents from the Major Organised Crime and Anti-Corruption Agency (MOCA) conducted an early-morning search at the Corporate Area home of a senior officer who had been assigned to C-TOC.
The officer was subsequently taken in handcuffs to two other locations in St Andrew and Clarendon, where additional searches were carried out.
Search operations were expected to continue overnight and into today at locations linked to other individuals under investigation.
The probe has also attracted the attention of Jamaica’s international law-enforcement partners.
MOCA confirmed late Wednesday that its agents were conducting a series of operations to execute “search and seizure warrants at a number of locations across the Corporate Area as part of an ongoing investigation”.
However, Major Basil Jarrett, MOCA’s director of communications, is yet to provide details about the investigation or the operations.
