PUERTO RICO POLICE SUSPENDED ON DRUGS ALLEGATIONS

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico, March 22 (Reuters) - Eight Puerto Rico commonwealth
police agents were suspended without pay on Monday for alleged
drug-trafficking offences, in what authorities called the force's largest
disciplinary action.

"This constitutes the largest suspension of police agents at any one time in
the history of the police force," said Police Superintendent Pedro Toledo in
announcing the culmination of an investigation that began in 1997.

Police alleged the eight suspended agents were part of a gang of corrupt
officers from in and around Caguas, a growing city on the southern border of
the San Juan metropolitan area. Six of the suspended officers were from a
drug trafficking investigations unit.

Authorities alleged the suspended agents offered protection to drug dealers,
and were involved in importing drugs into Puerto Rico from Caribbean islands
such as St. Croix and Curacao, as well as from Mexico.

Only two of the agents had criminal charges filed against them on Monday,
but Toledo said charges were expected against the other suspended officers.

Officer Edwin Rivera Jurado, the alleged leader of the gang, was charged
with bribery and cover-up, while Jose Dones Torres was charged with bribery,
officials said.

Police identified the other officers suspended as: Jaime Fortuno Martinez,
Aldaberto Fuentes Medina, Jose Candelaria Lopez, Edwin Nunez Cotto, Wilfredo
Silva Reyes, and Jose Miranda Rodriguez.

Officials said the gang could involve 14 people and that more arrests were
expected.

Earlier this month, four police officers were arrested by FBI agents for
allegedly providing protection to drug traffickers operating on the
southwest coast of Puerto Rico.

They were charged with accepting $5,000 each to offer traffickers escort
while transporting 200 pounds (90 kg) of cocaine between the towns of Santa
Isabel and Coamo.

Puerto Rico is attractive to drug traffickers as a backdoor to the lucrative
U.S. mainland market. Because it is a U.S. territory, items moving from
Puerto Rico to the U.S. mainland do not have to pass through U.S. Customs.

Investigators say many of the drugs imported into Puerto Rico wind up being
smuggled to cities along the U.S. East Coast.