Ex-Islands Chief Guilty in Drug Scheme, Acquitted of Smuggling

The former chief minister of the Turks and Caicos Islands was convicted of six counts Friday but acquitted of more severe drug smuggling charges. A second former minister was found guilty of conspiracy.

The two men were accused of conspiring to make the islands a way station for drug smuggling from Colombia to the United States.

Norman Saunders, the 41-year-old former chief minister, was convicted of conspiracy to travel in furtherance of a drug plot, but found not guilty of conspiracy to smuggle marijuana and cocaine. He also was convicted on five counts of traveling in furtherance of an illicit drug transaction and faces a maximum 30-year prison term and a $60,000 fine.

Stafford Missick, the British crown colony’s former minister of commerce and development, was convicted by the federal jury of conspiracy to import cocaine and marijuana, conspiracy to travel in aid of the scheme and two travel act violations.

Missick, 47, faces a maximum sentence of 35 years and a $280,000 fine.

Saunders and Missick were arrested March 5 after they were secretly videotaped at a Miami hotel accepting $20,000 from two men acting as drug smugglers who were actually working for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. After the arrests, the men resigned their posts in the islands near the Bahamas.

A third former Turks and Caicos official, Aulden Smith, once the island’s parliamentary secretary, will be tried later.

The fourth of the original defendants, Quebec businessman Andre Fournier, pleaded guilty July 1 to counts of travel and conspiracy to travel in furtherance of the plot. He is awaiting sentencing.