COKE SMUGGLER HAILED AS ROBIN HOOD

B.C. Man Aided Indian Villagers

A man who bragged to undercover U.S. police officers that he imported
36 tonnes of cocaine into B.C. has led a double life as a modern-day
Robin Hood.

Authorities in California busted Harjeet Mann, 49, who hails from
B.C., and two American men last month for conspiring to traffic 70
kilograms of cocaine.

But according to a report in The Asian Pacific Post, Mann and his
alleged accomplices have hearts of gold.

"While the suspects face life in a U.S. jail and fines up to $4
million, their friends and family in their native villages [in Punjab,
India] say the three were philanthropists who spent millions of rupees
to construct roads, improve civic amenities and arrange marriages for
the poor," said the article in yesterday's Post.

A press release on the big bust issued by the U.S. Drug Enforcement
Agency in Bakersfield, Calif., said Mann, Jasdev Singh, 32, and
Sukharj Dhaliwal, 38, all reside in Bakersfield.

"Mann indicated that during the past five years he had shipped
approximately 36,000 kilograms of cocaine from Bakersfield to Canada,"
said the DEA release.

"In Canada, Mann's customers 'cut' the product for street
sales.

"Mann claimed, 'I'm the biggest there is.' He also offered to sell the
undercover officer 50-kilogram buckets of ephedrine, a precursor
chemical used to manufacture methamphetamine, for $33,000 a bucket and
told the undercover officer he smuggled the ephedrine into the United
States from his native country of India," said the release.

But the poor people of Cheemna village know a different side of the
three men.

"Ever since they have settled in the USA, they have been generously
spending lakhs [hundreds of thousands] of rupees every year on
construction of village roads, public urinals and marriages of poor
girls, besides giving donations for religious causes," Amarjit Singh,
former member of the Cheemna council, told media in India, the Post
reported.

"They are frequent visitors here and no one can even imagine them as
narcotics smugglers."

The three men face a maximum sentence of life in prison if
convicted.

"The cocaine trade is alive and well in British Columbia," RCMP media
liaison Acting Staff-Sgt. Tim Shields told The Province.

"We all as a society have to do whatever we can to try and take this
cocaine off our streets.

"It makes its way into our schools and into the lives of young
people," said Shields.

"It gets turned into crack cocaine, which is a highly addictive,
highly destructive drug."

Shields said he was not aware of any criminal involvement by anyone
named Harjeet Mann.