Word: transitive
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Convicted Trafficker Leigh Bruce Ritch of the Cayman Islands and Money Launderer Ramon Milian Rodriquez, a Cuban-born American, described some of the services provided by Noriega and his associates in exchange for a percentage of the drug proceeds: transit from airports and docks in guarded cars and armored trucks, round-the-clock bodyguards for leading dealers, limousines, apartments, bank accounts, even planes to fly to and from Colombia to drum up new business...
...trial of Cocaine Kingpin Lehder, who in the late 1970s acquired parts of Norman's Cay, using its 3,000-ft. runway as a refueling point for drug loads. Former Lehder associates have testified that Pindling and other officials were paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to ensure smooth transit. Pindling denies the charges...
...more recent safe haven for the traffickers is Honduras. Its location, only a few hours' flying time from Florida, and its many secluded airstrips make Honduras an ideal transit point. Last November a shipment of mahogany boards arriving in Florida from Honduras was packed with 8,052 lbs. of cocaine. A few days later the Honduran military attache in Colombia, Colonel William Said Speer, was linked to traffickers when Cartel Member Ochoa was arrested while driving Said's $80,000 sports car in Colombia. "The upper echelon of our military has been corrupted," charges a Honduran official...
Costa Rica, by contrast, seems an unlikely target for the Medellin cartel. The country has no army, is not dominated by greedy generals or politicians, and is proud of a democratic tradition. Yet Costa Rica's ports and its more than 200 rural airstrips have become key transit points for cocaine cargos. In recent years the Costa Rican business community has noticed that shipments of perishable products receive a less rigorous Customs inspection than nonperishable goods upon entering the U.S. Thus they are often used to conceal drugs...
...same can be said of attempts at interdiction. For each shipment discovered in such transit countries as Panama, Costa Rica and Honduras, several others coast through. Yet U.S. officials nonetheless believe that if drug dealers feel pressured, they may resort to riskier routes and contacts, making their organizations more vulnerable to penetration...