62-Year-Old Ghanaian Jailed 14 Years In US

Heroin

A leader of an international heroin smuggling ring that brought more than $800,000 worth of heroin from Ghana through Dulles International Airport has been sentenced to 14 years in prison.

Sixty two year-old Edward Macauley was arrested in Ghana last year and extradited to Virginia to face federal charges.

Macauley is one of 12 defendants who've been charged.

He pleaded guilty in January and was sentenced at U.S. District Court in Alexandria on Friday.

The organization recruited Ghanaian citizens living legally in the U.S. to act as couriers. They were paid up to $15,000 a trip to smuggle as much as $250,000 worth of heroin, typically by packing the drugs in the lining of carry-on bags.

Airport officials in Ghana received bribes of $2,000 or more to look the other way.

The drugs were smuggled through Dulles International Airport through a variety of methods: special compartments built into carry-on luggage, attached to underwear. In one case, the smugglers had sewn two pounds of heroin into a courier's wig.

The ring smuggled more than 10 pounds of heroin — worth more than $800,000 — from Ghana into the U.S. before it was shut down.

The case demonstrates the creativity of those who try to smuggle drugs into the country, as well as the efforts that federal authorities to extend enforcement of U.S. laws on an international basis.

Many of the dozen people charged in this scheme were arrested in Ghana and extradited to face trial in U.S. District Court in Alexandria. Sentences handed down so far have ranged from 2 years for one of the low-level couriers to Macauley, who prosecutors said was a ringleader.

U.S. District Judge James Cacheris imposed the term prosecutors requested. Macauley's court-appointed attorney, William Cummings, had asked for the mandatory minimum of 10 years, citing Macauley's age and disputing the government's portrayal of Macauley as a ringleader.

Prosecutor James P. Gillis said the evidence showed Macauley was indeed a leader — his co-conspirators even called him 'Boss.'

'Mr. Macauley was at the top of this food chain,' Gillis told the judge. 'He's not just referred to as 'boss.' He is the boss.'

Also Friday, Fred Brobbery, was sentenced to nearly seven years for his role. Brobbery's role on several smuggling runs was to build special compartments into the lining of the smugglers' carry-on luggage. Other smugglers hid the drugs in their underwear or wigs.

When the charges in this case were announced last year, the Drug Enforcement Administration said it reflects the current strategy of targeting smugglers in their home countries. The DEA has agents in more than 60 countries working international cases; the DEA said it received strong cooperation from Ghanaian authorities on this investigation. The ring was in operation for only about a year before the charges were filed.

Customs agents at Dulles are accustomed to finding drugs in unusual places. In cases unrelated to the Macauley ring, a Nigerian man was arrested earlier this year after setting an apparent record at Dulles when he ingested 180 pellets filled with nearly five pounds of heroin in a failed smuggling attempt. Officers have found heroin in juice boxes and cocaine stuffed inside whole roasted chickens.