Corrupt CANU rank busted
Kaieteur News
January 24, 2007
A Customs Anti-Narcotics Unit (CANU) officer is now in Police custody having admitted to taking a bribe from an outgoing passenger at the Cheddi Jagan International Airport, Timehri, yesterday.
Overseas-based Guyanese Ronald Persaud was the outgoing passenger on a North American Airways flight bound for New York . He had already cleared Customs and Immigration, and was about to board the aircraft when a Securicor rank stopped him and questioned him about some birds that he was attempting to take out of the country.
He had about one dozen birds in a bag into which he had punched some holes.
When the Securicor rank detained Persaud, the overseas-based Guyanese immediately fingered the CANU officer as the person who helped him slip the birds past Customs and Immigration.
Persaud told a tale of recruiting the CANU officer by paying him US$550 to have him bring in the birds and deliver them to him in the waiting area.
Immediately, the Securicor rank called the Police, who detained the CANU rank on whose person they found the money — all US$550. The CANU rank immediately confessed to not only helping the departing Guyanese, but also to taking the money.
He remains in custody and Persaud was prevented from leaving the country.
One airport source said that if the CANU rank was open to smuggling birds, one could imagine what else he might have done under similar conditions.