Remember how earlier this year a Canadian airline crew was detained in the Dominican Republic, after they reported $25 million in cocaine hidden in the maintenance bay of their aircraft? Well, within the past few days a documentary has been released about this case, and I finally got around to watching it last night. All…
Continue reading: Cocaine Cargo: Pivot Airlines Drug Bust Investigation
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Seems illegal drugs and real estate are linked. Maybe if everyone would boycott illegal drugs they might find housing become more affordable as it is no longer being used as a laundering vehicle. Do less drugs, live inside.
If Ben's surmise is right (which I think it probably is) there's nothing Pivot Airlines did that was peciliar to their Canadian nationality. An American charter company could just as easily have accepted money for a charter and flown to Punta Cana. What the Dominican "justice" system did to this flight crew was unconscionable. But the fact that the Doninican government didn't cave to Canadian consular pressure? That is a very Canadian story.
Man imagine reporting drugs as you should and being detained for months on end
The Canadian crew were scape goats until the the whole mess was swept up (bribes?) and the actors were far in the wind. Probably there are now no witnesses and the evidence is missing. Nobody will be further accused. Business as usual. Sadly for the crew this is a stain that might resurface because proving innocence is more difficult than proving guilt. Just my take.
And to think that all this could be legal, run by Fortune 500 companies at maximum efficiency, and taxed to the hilt… all of a sudden there would be enough money to fund free healthcare for everyone!
The article says that there were four passengers who had faced criminal charges. We do not know if they were ever convicted. Secondly, people who have actual criminal records fly every day, all over the world.
Ben - you failed to mention to terrifying and horrible treatment the crew received during those nine days of being held in jail.
What would you have done as the maintenance guy?
On the one had you don’t want to be on a plane landing in Canada with $25 million in drugs. On the other hand if you say something the guys whose coke it is aren’t going to be happy. They will in fact be very very unhappy. With you.
Having worked in International Operation in the Caribbean for major carrier I can tell you this is fairly typical for the DR.
Of course the security cam footage is missing, no surprise there.
Corruption at the airport level (and even in the Aviation Dept) is so widespread in the Caribbean.
We had numerous seizures out of the DR/Jamaica/Curacao amongst other locations. Of course Corporate Security involved - in none of the cases was the crew found to be involved - most times they were completely unaware as this occurred below wing on the ground.
Did Pivot Airlines ever get its plane back? The previous article mentioned that this was their only plane.
Better writen: Latin Americans just supplying to the drug-addicted North Americans what they want!
Ben,
If the crew needed to stay there for 8 months and were not in jail and could not leave the island - I assume they stayed at a hotel? AirBnB? where? Did they get points? Did they get upgraded to suites? These are the details that we expect from your site 🙂
-m
How did you see the documentary? Is there a way I can watch it as well (I live in the U.S.)?
Or, they might find that less housing construction happens, thereby reducing supply and pushing up prices…
@ michael -- The airline rented a villa for them, so it sounds like there were no points or room upgrades, hah.
@ Scudder -- Sorry for the confusion, I always try to clarify this in the intro section. In this case I wrote "I wanted to share my updated take on this incident, now that I’ve seen this." Then the section with my take on the documentary is primarily what's new. I'll try to make this clearer going forward.
Thank you for posting the link to the television show. I watched the program and appreciated the quality of the reporting. I have been following Canadian stories more and learned about the ability of the Dominican Republic to hold someone with no charges for a year. It is something I will keep in mind in my travels.
I have a friend who insists that "It won't happen to you." However, I don't listen to those types of people, because they are the same people who won't help me if I were to be arrested.
technically he did talk about that in his previous post on this incident... He did say this was just an update.
North Americans are just living for the high all the time. What a sad state of affairs.
At first when listening to the two female passengers, I assumed they were all innocent like the crew. Then in the film it stated that all the passengers on the second flight knew each other and the one was part of the fake Trust real estate company who paid for their flight. They were mules, knowingly and I bet they will be spending many years in jail. I mean someone pays for your tickets on a expensive charter flight and when asked about it, you state your lawyer tells you to not comment. All those passengers on that 2nd flight probably guilty.
Drug gangs are so powerful and connected they can place associates into key roles in whichever enterprises are needed to assist with smuggling gigs. If a signature maintenance guy gets nailed and jailed he gets replaced like a light bulb and on with the show. Governments are powerless to put a stop to this stuff.
And an accurate one at that. Everything that can go wrong has a plan B because you just pay extra actors extra money. It is one long movie.
I thought this was an excellent investigative reporting. The interview with the two female passengers hit a red flag for me . When ask if they thought that they may be drug mules both denied it then one of the females says maybe the plane was a drug mule or it was being used as a mule . The other female then says Well its obvious the plane was because they found the drugs on the plane . Red flag for me