Posted on: www.dailyguideghana.com
By William Yaw Owusu
Tuesday, March 3, 2015
Owner of Sohin
Security Check Limited – the company that was providing security at the Kotoka
International Airport (KIA) – Solomon Adelaquaye has been deported after
serving a 24-month jail term in the USA.
He was jailed in the
US for dealing in heroin, a narcotic drug, for only 24 months because he
cooperated with investigators, according to sources.
He arrived on Friday,
February 13, 2015 via Delta Air Lines Flight 478 and was immediately whisked
away by NACOB officials for debriefing.
A US Department of
Homeland Security document that details Adelaquaye's deportation shows that he
has been banned from entering the US for life.
"You have been
found to be inadmissible to the United States under the provisions of Section
212(a) of the Immigration and Nationality Act or deportable under the
provisions of Section 237 of the Act as a Visa Pilot Waiver Programme violator.
In accordance with the provisions of Section 212(a) (9) of the Act, you are
prohibited from entering, attempting to enter, or being in the United
States," a notice to Alien Ordered Removed/Departure Verification filed on
December 31 last year indicated.
Adelaquaye was
arrested in May 2013 with two Nigerians and a Colombian following a joint US-Ghana
operation.
He was tipping off
drug barons as well as aiding them to use the KIA for their operations.
The ex-convict was
said to have secured the KIA security contract using his National Democratic
Congress (NDC) connection.
Aggravated Felony
“At any time, because
in addition to being found inadmissible, you have convicted of crime designated
as an aggravated felony,” the document whose subject identity was 351750614
affirmed Adalaquaye’s case.
Adalaqauye who was
touted as an NDC financier from 2009 had been issued a two-year US Multiple
Entry Visa with Control number 20131235160003.
He served his two
year jail term and has since been deported to Ghana. He was jailed for only 24 months because he
co-operated with investigators, according to sources arriving on Friday,
February 13, 2015 via Delta Air Lines Flight 478 and was immediately whisked
away by NACOB officials for debriefing.
US investigators were
able to prove that Adalaquaye by virtue of his position at Ghana’s main airport
was able to conspire with others to export narcotic drugs to the America.
He stood trial
together with Colombian Samuel Antonia Pinedo-Rueda and Nigerians Frank Muodum
and Celestine Ofor Orjinweke.
US Under-Cover Agents
During the trial it emerged
that at a meeting on February 25, 2012 at Adalaquaye's office at the KIA in
Accra, a US under-cover agent who feigned interest in the narcotic drugs
business said he had hidden 1kg of heroin in his laptop, and the Sohin Security
boss was able to use his influence to by-pass security checks and hand over the
computer to the agent later.
The agent again was
able to give Adalaquaye $6,000 cash to guarantee the safe passage of the heroin
through the airport.
It adds that at a
separate meeting in Accra in May 2013, another US under-cover agent who posed
as a dealer from Colombia was able to discuss with Adelaquaye, Muodum and
Orjinweke a plan to supply them with 3,000kg of cocaine, valued at $25,000 per
kilogram, in exchange for an amount of heroin of similar value.
Adelaquaye, Muodum,
and Orjinweke told the agent that they could transport the heroin to the United
States by airplane in multiple shipments of 25kg each.
Adelaquaye and the
Nigerians were arrested in New York soon thereafter while Pinedo-Rueda was
apprehended in Colombia.
FIC Factor
In a related
development, the security agencies are yet to disclose the steps they took when
fresh allegations emerged against Adalaquaye over the €1million (approximately
GH¢2.6million at the time) which was reportedly found in his local bank
account.
The amount was
tracked down by the covert agency- the Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC) –
instituted to hunt money launderers in Ghana, as far back as October 2012.
The FIC’s
investigations had been triggered by a whistleblower within Five Stars Mining
Company Ltd, the mining company also owned by Adalaquaye and a confidential
document of October 10, 2012 was addressed to then National Security Coordinator,
Larry Gbevlo-Lartey.
Mining Decoy
Investigations
conducted by the FIC into the activities and operations of Five Star Mining
Company Limited later revealed that although it was registered with the
Registrar General’s Department to do mining prospecting and mining, as well as
deal in mining equipment and chemicals, “the company was engaged in an unlawful
business since it has no mandate from PMMC to deal in gold.”
The FIC accordingly
wrote to the National Security Coordinator to inform him of the outcome of its
investigations in a letter of December 13, 2012, in which it also identified
the Directors of the company as including Adelaquaye who was CEO, one Mark
Archibald, Rufus Kofi Korvili Mensah and Eric Kwaku Harrison as the secretary,
all purported to be bearing Ghanaian passports.
Gbevlo-Lartey Alerted
The letter had alerted
Col. Gbevlo-Lartey about the fraudulent activities of Adalaquaye in the report
including how Adelaquaye’s mining company’s bank account number 8700231292600
with a local bank (name withheld) has been used as a conduit for laundering all
sorts of fraudulent money for his partners abroad.
The Sohin Security
boss was believed to have retained 50 per cent of all the monies transferred
through him as payment for allowing his account to be used for the fraudulent
movement of cash.
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