Two women also on separate charges
By Oluatoyin Alleyne
in New York
A Guyanese man who was charged in New York after excreting 44 pellets of cocaine appeared in a Brooklyn court yesterday for a further hearing on his matter.
Marvin Martins was held on September 13 after he arrived at the JFK Airport on a Delta Airlines flight.
His lawyer, Michael Schneider told Judge Leo Glaassar yesterday that he has to discuss with his client a plea bargain offered by the government.
Prosecutor Richard Tucker told the court that Martins appeared before a magistrate last Friday and was released on US200,000 bail and was also ordered to wear an electronic bracelet to monitor his movements.
He also told the court that he had objected to the defendant being granted bail since he had been living in Guyana with his wife and daughter for the past eight years even though he is a citizen of the US.
But when asked by Judge Glassar if he wanted to renew his objections to bail the prosecutor answered in the negative.
Martins’ lawyer then asked for 30 days to continue discussions on the plea bargain and the judge set November 13 as the return date.
According to Special Agent with the Immigration and Custom Enforcement (ICE), Xiao Ren, in an affidavit seen by this newspaper, Martins arrived at the airport at around 2:30 pm on September 13 and was pulled in for questioning by customs officers because of his nervous behaviour.
It was observed that Martins travelled on a ticket that was purchased with cash just four days earlier and when questioned about who purchased the ticket he told the officer that his brother purchased it for US$1,000. However, when asked for a number to verify his story Martins was unable to do so. He also told the officer that he lived with his grandparents in the US but they were unaware that he was returning home.
Special Agent Ren said it was then observed that Martins had made four trips in the last year and when this observation was made he admitted that he had ingested narcotics. He was taken to JFK’s Medical Facility and about 5 pm that day he passed out five pellets of cocaine. He passed out a total of 44 pellets.
The amount of cocaine contained in the pellets mounted to 612.1 grammes and Martins was then charged and placed before a magistrate’s court.
Reporters who turned up at the Brooklyn court to cover the case yesterday were verbally abused by a female relative of Martins.
Meanwhile, two other Guyanese also appeared in the court this week charged with trafficking in narcotics.
Latoya Corley was caught last week Friday at the JFK airport allegedly attempting to smuggle cocaine into the US in a book, album, portfolio and a briefcase.
According to information sworn to by ICE Special Agent, Joseph Jerla, the defendant arrived on Carib-bean Airlines Flight 424 on a ticket purchased just days before her flight and on a newly-issued passport.
She was questioned and a book found on her person was discovered to contain cocaine between its pages.
Her briefcase was also checked along with the album and portfolio that was found in the briefcase and all three allegedly had cocaine.
Joseph said the cocaine amounted to 535.6 grammes. She appeared in front of Judge Joan Azrack and was granted US$150,000 bail.
Another Guyanese woman, Shundell Ricketts was also granted the same amount of bail when she appeared before Judge Eric N Vitalino.
Donald Frareir of ICE in his affidavit said Ricketts arrived in the country on September 8 at JFK on a Delta Airlines flight 384 from Guyana.
She claimed two soft-sided roller ‘Gotcha’ suitcases that were plastic wrapped.
When officers at the airport checked her luggage it was found that the smaller suitcase had a false bottom that contained five kilogrammes of cocaine.
