Jensen La Vende

Po­lice ar­rest­ed three drug run­ners in Co­corite yes­ter­day in what was de­scribed by some as a scene straight from an ac­tion movie.The dra­ma start­ed af­ter armed Coast Guard of­fi­cers were seen chas­ing a fish­ing boat in the Gulf of Paria with five sus­pects, il­le­gal guns and drugs. Po­lice on­shore were alert­ed and pre­pared them­selves to as­sist their col­leagues.

Ac­cord­ing to po­lice re­ports, around 1.45 pm mem­bers of the Coast Guard re­ceived a tip that a pirogue was smug­gling drugs and guns in­to the coun­try. The Coast Guard, af­ter li­ais­ing with their po­lice coun­ter­parts, chased the ves­sel, which had four men on board, to shore near the dock of par­ty boat, Har­bour Mas­ter.Po­lice said three men jumped off and head­ed for land. The fourth sus­pect at­tempt­ed to es­cape on the open sea but was stopped a short dis­tance away at the Co­corite fish­ing de­pot.

Coast Guard of­fi­cials said as the boat was com­ing ashore the men threw a bag over­board which they be­lieved was filled with guns. When po­lice searched the boat they found a quan­ti­ty of mar­i­jua­na. The bag thrown over­board had not been found up to last night.

With as­sis­tance from the Na­tion­al Op­er­a­tions Cen­tre (NOC) he­li­copter, one of the three men ar­rest­ed ini­tial­ly pre­tend­ed to be an em­ploy­ee of Reel Tack­le, which is lo­cat­ed along the West­ern Main Road. The oth­er two sus­pects were held af­ter run­ning through the com­pound of Econo Car Rentals.Eye­wit­ness­es told the T&T Guardian that af­ter the trio came ashore po­lice were seen chas­ing them and fir­ing in the air in at­tempt to get them to sur­ren­der.

The po­lice even­tu­al­ly caught one of the men and lat­er ar­rest­ed the oth­er, even as he at­tempt­ed to "blend in" with mem­bers of the pub­lic. Up to press time the fourth man was still on the run.