After having a few weeks to think it through, I’m afraid the premise of my argument is still hinged on my opinion that the current war being waged on drugs in the Caribbean has unintended causalities, far outweighing the narcotics trafficking the arrest would have hoped to stymie. As international police agencies cherry-pick their way in combating this scourge, the subsequent arrests are for crimes punishable only in that agency’s own country. The horrors left behind in their wake – indictable crimes – are often left to be sorted out by fragile, teetering societies.
This policy hasn’t produced any major successes in dealing with narcotics in other Latin American countries, any more than we hope Roger Khan’s conviction will be a major blow to trafficking in Guyana. In fact in takes advantage of an already fragile society, rife with crime and corruption that’s woven into everyday politics, which makes it even worse.
Could someone please explain to me how this policy could ever be effective in fighting the narcotics trade when the only teeth it has, carries a fifteen to twenty-year bite – a walk in the park for most drug dealers, who, more often than we realize, rat on their own kind, get a sweeter deal at their sentencing, and are never heard from again. The reason is that more often than we care to think, part of the deal came with the resources for witness relocation after serving time.
Meanwhile, the police agency rearms itself with new information to continue the fight against the most wanted drug dealer, the one who has replaced the one who was recently busted in the biggest raid on the narcotics trade in Guyana – and the cycle continues. But the issues affecting Latin American countries and Guyana alike are never addressed, thus the crime wave continues amidst corrupt officials blinded by pay-offs. The sophisticated money-laundering networks are still in place, and it’s business as usual.
The corrupt officials who remain in power have learnt well from others. They know they only have to remain still in the face of a brief exposure, as we play host to the DEA in the hope it would solve a bigger issue: crime and those same corrupt officials. The fine print of that US policy should read, “Let me punish your criminals for you, but you keep your crime.” As the sentencing judge pointed out, the US government would not have been able to prosecute Roger Khan for the heinous acts committed in Guyana.
While Roger Khan serves his fifteen-year sentence, three of which have already passed, we are left with the same corrupt officials we had before his arrest. They still deny any and all involvement; the opposition still makes muted cries for help, and everything should return to normal in a few months.
While Roger Khan waived some of his rights in his plea bargain deal in New York, that didn’t help secure justice for anyone in Guyana. Waddell’s family wasn’t served by this deal. The family of the slain football coach wasn’t served by this deal. The families of countless Guyanese who died at the hands of criminals weren’t served by this deal.
I’m not implying Roger Khan was solely responsible for the hundreds who died during the infamous crime spree, but this application of the US drug policy and subsequent sentencing do not punish those who were outed in same trial and could be deemed culpable. Neither am I saying the United States should come in with one fell swoop and eradicate the problem, because it’s the US ‘cherry-picking’ approach which led us here in the first place.
We send Guyana’s criminals to the US, they spend US currency earned exploiting Guyanese on US lawyers defending them in US courts for crimes committed against the United States. They then serve time in US jails at a tidy profit to the US economy, then return to Guyana in the US deportee programme, broke. Once again, I beg for someone to step forward and explain how this policy serves Guyana.
In punishing the drug dealers, the US oftentimes cannot prosecute crimes they unearth during their investigations, since they were committed in another jurisdiction. That jurisdiction this time being Guyana, the country is now left saddled with the burden of trying to decipher if the DEA actually serves the interest of the region, or is just another self-serving master.
I think Lady Justice applied the foreign exchange rate in this one, for I cannot see for the life of me how Roger Khan is sentenced to fifteen years and Robert Simels has a life sentence hanging over his head. Seems as though the crimes committed in Guyana, no matter how heinous they may be, do not quite measure up to crimes committed in the United States.
Yours faithfully,
Ron G Elcock
