Khan, bodyguards were in Suriname two weeks prior to arrest -sources
Stabroek News
December 3, 2006
Roger Khan and his bodyguards were hiding out in Suriname two weeks before they were arrested in a huge drug bust in Paramaribo, sources close to the men have said.
And their capture in Paramaribo was as a result of intelligence surveillance by lawmen in Suriname. Stabroek News was told that it would appear that authorities in the Dutch-speaking state had received intelligence that Khan was in the country. Once this information was received they conducted a number of searches in areas where they thought he might have been before finding him. This newspaper was told also that after Khan and his associates went into hiding following the issuing of wanted bulletins in Guyana for their arrests back in March local police had informed their counterparts in Suriname to be on the lookout for them.
It would seem that the capture of Khan and the trio along with five Surinamese was a well-coordinated operation. Observers say that the fact that Suriname did not lay any charge against Khan or his guards for narcotics trafficking or any other crime indicates that the Guyanese were apparently lured to Suriname so that the US could capture him to face a drug charge in New York.
Local police in a charge brought against Khan's three bodyguards: Sean Belfield, Paul Rodrigues and Lloyd Roberts on Monday alleged that the trio had departed Guyana illegally between June 15 and 16.
Speaking to Stabroek News on Friday, sources close to the men said that they found it strange that the police instituted a charge which claimed that the men departed Guyana on June 15, the same day they were arrested in a house in Paramaribo. After the issuing of wanted bulletins for Khan, Rodrigues, Ricardo Rodrigues and Gerald Pereira by the police following searches on their properties in the wake of the theft of the army's 30 AK-47 rifles and the subsequent release of a number of taped conversations purportedly between the then Commissioner of Police, Winston Felix and other persons, the businessman collected his bodyguards and they fled to Berbice.
"The heat was on in the city so as to avoid confrontations with the joint services they went to Berbice," one source said.
The joint services launched a massive cordon and search exercise on the morning of March 18 during which time they seized a quantity of cocaine, guns and other items at various locations connected to Khan and his associates. As a result of this, the police issued wanted bulletins for the businessman and the other three men, but instead, Khan through his lawyer challenged the wanted bulletins and began releasing a series of statements to the press. He also admitted later that he was behind the distribution of taped conversations between Felix and others, which he handed over to officials of the US Embassy in Georgetown. As pressure mounted on Khan and with the US issuing an arrest warrant for him following an indictment for conspiracy to import cocaine into that country his statements to the press intensified.
He charged in some of the statements that he used his own resources to help fight crime, claiming that a network of former policemen and ex-convicts were his informants. Khan also said that the indictment brought against him by the US was politically motivated.
Despite issuing these statements, the businessman was not seen by anyone and subsequently it was learnt that he had gone into hiding. Police and soldiers searched his home as well as those of his relatives and friends. Several persons were locked up and items seized from the homes.
It was in the middle of May, a source close to the businessman said, when Khan, Belfield, Roberts and Rodrigues travelled up to Berbice in the company of others.
Sources said that the men went there to hide but the joint services apparently heard about their move and searches were carried out in Berbice for them. One source said that during one of the many searches in Berbice Khan was in a house nearby and saw what was going on. Fearful, that they would have been caught, Khan and the trio travelled across to neighbouring Suriname sometime around June 1. They reportedly used the illegal ferry crossing at Corriverton to cross the border into Suriname.
Suriname had held the trio for five months while investigating them on allegations of being part of a criminal gang as well as for possession and trafficking in narcotics. The charges were withdrawn and the men were deported last week Tuesday.