Businessman awaits July verdict after $130m cocaine bust
Published:Wednesday | May 31, 2023 | 12:11 AMChristopher Thomas/Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
Rohan Cummings, the western Jamaica businessman who was reportedly held with cocaine valued at US$850,000 (J$130,008,520) in a bus he was driving, will know his fate on July 5 when the verdict in the case is handed down in the St James Parish Court.
Cummings, who was arrested in March 2022 and later charged with possession of, dealing in, trafficking, and conspiracy to traffic 17 kilograms of cocaine, got the decision date and had his bail extended on Monday, after he gave an unsworn statement in his defence before trial judge Kaysha Grant Pryce.
In his unsworn testimony, given from the prisoner’s dock, Cummings told the court that, on March 7, 2022, he had purchased paint and other hardware supplies from a store in Newmarket, St Elizabeth, prior to being stopped by the police on the Long Hill roadway in St James. He insisted that he knew nothing about the cocaine, which was reportedly found in the vehicle, a Toyota Hiace bus.
“I got stopped at Long Hill, and the police searched up the van. I saw the officer take off some panels from off the inside and he said, ‘what is this?’ and I told him, ‘I don’t know what that is.’ When I went to the hardware, I never put anything in the van, they packed it themselves,” said Cummings.
Through his attorney, Henry McCurdy, Cummings informed the court that he would not be calling any witnesses in his defence.
In setting the verdict hearing for July 5, Grant Pryce explained to Cummings that she needed time to review his unsworn statement and the testimony previously given by the prosecution’s police witness on April 28.
“I have to read over all of the evidence and apply the law according to the facts, and that will need to take some time. On July 5 we are anticipating the verdict, whether I find you guilty or not guilty,” Grant Pryce explained to Cummings.
According to court documents, Cummings was stopped by the police at Long Hill on March 7, 2022, at 2:45 p.m., and when the bus he was driving was searched, the cocaine was found in the left-hand and right-hand panels of the vehicle.
The cocaine was reportedly found wrapped in 16 packages, which were previously brought before the court as evidence for the prosecution’s case. Under caution, Cummings claimed that he had borrowed the bus in order to pay a visit to his granddaughter. He was taken into custody and interviewed, following which he was arrested and charged with breaching the Dangerous Drugs Act.