SENTENCE REDUCED FOR DRUG SMUGGLER

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The Supreme Court has sentenced a 34 year old man to four and a half years in prison, after he was arrested in July 2010, whilst carrying a shipment of nearly 70 kilos of hashish on a boat which was caught between the Almería coastal towns of Adra and El Ejido. The man also assaulted two of the officers involved in the arrest.

On the evening of the 20th of July, 2010, a coastal surveillance system identified what appeared to be the transfer of goods between two boats, around 6.5 nautical miles off the coast of Adra, and subsequently launched a patrol boat “Almanzora” to investigate.

The Guardia Civil officers then approached the ship, on which the smuggler, identified by the initials KT, along with a second, unidentified person was seen. The sailors then saw the patrol and immediately fled at speed, and were seen to be throwing several packages into the sea, until they ran aground at the playa de La Fabriquilla, in Balerma.

Once ashore, the officers gave chase on foot, during which KT was caught, at which point he pushed one officer and knocked him to the ground while a second was kicked during the struggle. Both suffered injuries took around ten days to heal.

The officers managed to seize Drugs seized several batches of hashish, with an estimated market value of more than 101,000 euro.

Following the original sentencing, the case was brought before an appeal court and was heard this week, the judgement being that the sentence already set by the district court was reduced by 14 months, as the defence appealed that the size of the boat being used was only 5.43 meters long and 2.16 meters wide, and therefore the sentence for the crime should not have been as strict as to class it as an offence against public health, but should in fact be classed as an offence against Article 370.3 of the Criminal Code.

The sentence of a year in prison for the assault on the officers remains however, and the criminal must also pay a fine of six euro per day for a period of two months, which would allow for 600 euro each in compensation to be paid to the injured Guardia Civil officers.