East Legon Cocaine Case:Judgement On Oct 25 .

By William Yaw Owusu

Saturday, 21 July 2007
AN Accra Fast Track High Court trying two Venezuelans in connection with 588.88 kilogrammes of cocaine seized in a house at East Legon in November 2005, will give judgment on October 25.

The court, presided over by Justice E.K. Ayebi, at its sitting yesterday, asked both the prosecution led by Ms. Getrude Aikins, acting Director of Public Prosecutions, and defence counsel, Mr. Kwablah Dogbe Senanu, to file their addresses before the end of August.

The accused,, Joel Mella, a machine operator and Halo Cabezza Castillo, 38, businessman, have pleaded not guilty to four counts of conspiracy, importation and possessing narcotic drugs without lawful authority.

Another Venezuelan, David Duarte Vasquez, believed to be the brain behind the importation of the narcotic substance, is at large.

Vasquez has been charged together with the two accused persons.

The prosecution invited eight witnesses to testify during the trial while the defence did not call any.

The facts of the case are that, on November 24, 2005, police detectives led by Superintendent Edward Tabiri, acting on a tip-off, went to house number 348 at Mempeasem, East Legon, Accra, and found Mella there.

He was arrested and he led the team to the upper floor of the house where a thorough search revealed. three bottles of ammonized substance which is used to turn cocaine into crack, a vacuum machine used to compress cocaine into compact pieces, 13 gloves, white polythene wrappers and KLM Cargo stickers..

Other items found were brown cellotape, a testing bottle believed to be for testing cocaine, exercise books showing records of sales, and cell phones showing contact numbers of business partners.

When the officers peeped through the key hole of the room opposite that of Mella’s, they saw boxes packed there and therefore requested for the keys but he refused to release it. When the search team forced the door open, a number of compressed and wrapped items in boxes were found which the Ghana Standards Board tested and analysed to be cocaine.

The prosecution said Mella claimed the cocaine belonged to one Shamo or Bude, but investigators later concluded it was Vasquez.

The prosecutor told the court that in another room some of the drugs were found mixed with water and Mella even advised the police to "separate it from the rest of the 588 kilogrammes as the whole thing could get destroyed".

In the course of the search, Castillo came to the house and was also arrested. When his phone was seized, the police found the same number belonging to Vasquez on that phone.

Vasquez and a Dutchman, Vicente Cross, had set up a company called Compitex Limited and each owned 40 per cent of the shares, with the remaining 20 per cent belonging to Grace Asibere Asibi, the Ghanaian girlfriend of Vasquez.

The prosecution further said the company was set up to do import and export business with Vasquez as the Managing Director, but "this business was used as a front for the narcotics trade."

The prosecutor said Vasquez failed to secure entry visas for Mella and Castillo in August last year, but managed to bring Mella in to the country in September 9, the same year.