Drug trafficking

B.C. skipper evaded prosecution in Canada, convicted in U.S.

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Man faces long jail term for 400-kilos of cocaine on sailboat

Sun Kim Bolan – May 7, 2012

A controversial B.C. skipper has been convicted by a Florida jury of illegally carrying 400 kilos of cocaine on his sailboat off the coast of Colombia last fall.

John (Phil) Stirling has evaded criminal prosecution in B.C. twice after being caught on vessels with huge quantities of drugs — in 2001 with $300 million worth of cocaine and in 2006 with $6.5 million worth of marijuana.

The lethal war on Mexico’s journalists

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John Ralston Saul – June 3, 2011

Mexico’s human-rights rhetoric is second to none. It has been like this for a decade. The government has signed or ratified more than 20 human-rights treaties and considered more than 1,000 recommendations from various human-rights organizations.

These fine words and political gestures contradict the failure of successive administrations to tackle the reality of Mexican corruption and impunity – issues intensified by President Felipe Calderon’s “war on drugs.”

Mexican Poet inspires people's movement against drug cartels, corruption

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May 22, 2011

Over 35,000 people have died in Mexico’s drug war in the past four years. Many of them were innocent civilians, killed at random by the drug cartels in retaliation for the government’s crackdown on their trade. (15 min)

Video journalist Yaara Bou Melhem meets one of the most vocal people in the fight for action: poet Javier Sicilia, whose son and six friends were victims.

Free speech too costly for Mexican journalists

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Olivia Ward – June 2, 2011

For vacationing Canadians, Mexico is a haven of rest and recreation. But outside the cloistered confines of resorts, death takes no holiday for journalists trying to expose the brutality and corruption surrounding the country’s ongoing “war on drugs.”

A report released Friday says Canada should not turn a blind eye to violations of Mexican journalists’ rights, and that newly appointed Foreign Minister John Baird should put the defence of their rights on his agenda.

Canadian 'drug mafia don' flees Indian prison

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Adrian Humphreys – May 6, 2011

Embarrassed officials in India are searching for a Canadian dubbed the "drug mafia don from Canada" who escaped from prison on a motorcycle in the midst of his trial, where he stands accused of running that country's largest methamphetamine factory.

Xie Jing Feng, 52, a Canadian citizen also known as Richard, was at a food stall across from the prison in Vadodara, where he was in custody pending his high-profile drug case, when he asked one of his three guards to undo his handcuffs so he could wash his face.

Mexican officials take a bribe – or a bullet

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The drug cartel La Familia gives local officials a choice: Take a bribe or a bullet.

William Finnegan – May 31, 2010

On the morning before I arrived in Zitácuaro, a beautiful hill town in the western Mexican state of Michoacán, the dismembered body of a young man was left in the middle of the main intersection.

It was what people call corpse messaging. Usually it involves a mutilated body—or a pile of bodies, or just a head—and a handwritten sign. “Talked too much.” “So that they learn to respect.” “You get what you deserve.”

Crack: Drug fuels Calgary crime wave

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Michael Wood – February 9, 2011

Calgary—It is a scourge on our city, what cops say is the driving force behind most petty and property crimes and a common factor among numerous murders on our streets.

It is estimated to cost Alberta millions annually in related health care expenditures, loss of productivity and stolen property — from the bike scooped out of your neighbour’s garage to thousands of dollars worth of high-end gear lifted each week from Calgary merchants.

Quebec union leader was convicted drug producer

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Andrew McIntosh and Kinia Adamczyk – February 10, 2011

MONTREAL — A plumber hired to lead a Quebec construction union local in 2006 was convicted in 2003 of running a clandestine marijuana grow operation that was shuttered after a Montreal Urban Community Police raid, a QMI Agency investigation has found.

Union leader Dominique Bérube’s April 2003 drug conviction came after officers raided a warehouse in Montreal’s north end in 2002 and discovered 530 marijuana plants inside.

Afghan heroin glut hits home in Canada

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Alex Roslin and Bilbo Poynter – December 11, 2010

Treatment centres are struggling to cope with the surge of addicts hooked on the heroin that is pouring into Canada from war-torn Afghanistan.

It’s just before 1 p.m. on a cool, sunny Monday afternoon in late November. On a quiet residential street in Montreal’s east end, half a dozen heroin addicts are waiting by office phones and cellphones in the Méta d’Âme drop-in centre and residence for opiate users and recovering addicts.

Fearless reporters break silence at risk of their lives

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Olivia Ward – November 23, 2010

Luis Horacio Najera first stared death in the face when he was 19. A police officer was lying in the wreckage of his car after a catastrophic accident, and Najera, then a young journalism intern, found himself reluctantly watching as the dying man met his gaze.

“In life, there’s a spark in the eyes,” he said. “In death, I saw, they are like marbles.”

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