(CMR) Former Premier of the British Virgin Islands, Andrew Fahie (53), is facing life in prison after he was found guilty of conspiring to import cocaine into the United States along with three related money laundering and racketeering charges.
Fahie was arrested in April 2022 in Miami following a U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration sting operation.
A 12-member jury deliberated for more than four hours before arriving at a verdict late Thursday afternoon and unanimously convicted Fahie on all counts after a two-week trial. Sentencing is set for April 29 before U.S. District Judge Kathleen Williams.
Fahie was remanded following the verdict after being out on bail for nearly two years following his arrest.
During the trial, Fahie's attorney, Theresa Van Vliet, argued that her client had been framed by the United Kingdom government.
The U.S. government made its cocaine-smuggling case against Fahie by casting a confidential informant as the Mexican cartel trafficker. The informant, who went by the name “Roberto,” collected hundreds of recorded conversations and text messages with BVI premier Andrew Fahie while they discussed million-dollar bribery payments for access to the British territory,the Miami Herald reported.
Fahie agreed to let thousands of kilos of cocaine pass through his ports to be sold in the United States because of his “greed, arrogance and corruption,” prosecutors said, claiming Fahie needed the bribery payments to build a waterfront mansion in the British Virgin Islands.
“He is all in — he has no reluctance and no hesitation,” prosecutor Kevin Gerarde told jurors during closing arguments.
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