DEA, TTPS arrest two Trini men in 2023 cocaine case

Two Trinidad and To­ba­go cit­i­zens were ar­rest­ed on De­cem­ber 10 fol­low­ing a joint op­er­a­tion by US and Trin­bag­on­ian au­thor­i­ties, the US Em­bassy in T&T con­firmed in a state­ment yes­ter­day.

Dav­eanan De­onar­ine and Michael Sam­son­dar face charges in the East­ern Dis­trict of Louisiana for con­spir­a­cy to im­port co­caine in­to the Unit­ed States.

The ar­rests stem from a 2023 DEA in­ves­ti­ga­tion that led to the seizure of 168 kilo­grams of co­caine in Trinidad, val­ued at over TT$234 mil­lion. The May 18, 2023 op­er­a­tion marked the largest on­land drug seizure in Trin­bag­on­ian his­to­ry.

The US Em­bassy state­ment said the ar­rests were car­ried out by DEA per­son­nel from its Vet­ted Unit, sup­port­ed by the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice Spe­cial In­ves­tiga­tive Unit (SIU) and the Transna­tion­al Or­gan­ised Crime Unit (TOCU). 

Both sus­pects re­main in cus­tody pend­ing ex­tra­di­tion pro­ceed­ings to the US.

US Em­bassy Chargé d’Af­faires Dr Jenifer Nei­d­hart de Or­tiz said, “The US Em­bassy’s DEA per­son­nel and TOCU have been work­ing side by side for over two decades. The close work­ing re­la­tion­ship they have fos­tered, the mu­tu­al trust, and their ex­cel­lent law en­force­ment work show re­sults in these ar­rests. To­geth­er, the Unit­ed States and Trinidad and To­ba­go are mak­ing the re­gion safer and more se­cure for all of our cit­i­zens. I am proud of the work we do with our Trin­bag­on­ian coun­ter­parts day in and day out.”