CHARGES FILED IN T&T COURTS OVER KHAN HANDLING

AS THE Roger Khan saga continues, charges of kidnapping, false
imprisonment, and misconduct in public office have been filed
separately in a Trinidadian court against two Trinidad government
officials and a top ranking United States embassy agent in the
Caribbean twin-island republic implicated in handing the Guyanese
businessman over into U.S. custody.

Gary Tuggle, head of the U.S.' Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) in
Trinidad, David West, the head of Extradition Department in the
Trinidad Attorney General Chambers, and Stephen Sookram, a
Trinidadian immigration officer are likely to be served with notice
next week to answer the charges in the Arima Magistrates Court on December 8.

According to documents seen by the Sunday Chronicle, the charges were
laid in the Arima Magistrates Court on Thursday. The complainant is
Sherman Ramoutar, an attorney for Khan. Khan is in U.S. Federal
Prison awaiting a further hearing on charges that he conspired to
import cocaine into the United States.

In the first instance, all three men are charged with false
imprisonment, for having, on June 29, unlawfully and injuriously
imprisoning Khan and detaining him against his will.

The second charge of kidnapping, or "unlawfully and by force and
fraud" take and carry Khan against his will, was also filed against
all three men.

In the third charge, only West and Sookram are named for misconduct
in public office, "by unlawfully and injuriously imprisoning" Khan.

According to a local attorney for Khan, after the Guyanese
businessman was expelled from Suriname, he was descending the stairs
of the Surinamese airways flight at Piarco International Airport in
Trinidad when he was taken by Sookram. The Immigration officer then
took him to Tuggle, who saw him into an SUV and then into a private
jet to the United States where he is now in custody.

According to the lawyer, charges were filed against West also,
because he was the intellectual author of the events that transpired
in Trinidad.

Khan, 36, were arrested in what Suriname police said was a huge drug
bust that netted 213 kilos of cocaine on June 15 in Paramaribo.

Khan was flown from the country to the U.S. on June 29 after the
authorities there said they had no charges against him.

This was despite the fact that Suriname Minister of Justice, Mr.
Chandrikapersad Santokhi, had initially linked Khan to plots to
assassinate key government and judicial officials in that country and
had deemed him a threat to national and international security.

Santokhi had also told reporters that Khan, for about two years
before, was also being investigated for cocaine trafficking, firearm
possession and being part of a criminal gang.

Less than 24 hours after he was nabbed in Trinidad, Khan was
arraigned at the Brooklyn Federal Court in New York before Judge
Roanne Mann on a charge of "conspiring to import cocaine".

Meanwhile, the fate of the three Guyanese - Paul Rodrigues, Sean
Belfield and Lloyd Roberts - still in separate jails in Suriname
since they were nabbed on June 15 last, along with their alleged boss
man Roger Khan - remains uncertain.

The men, all ex-policemen, were said to be working as bodyguards for
Khan who has since been extradited to the United States and is due
for a third court appearance on September 18 in New York.