MIAMI DRUG SEIZURE MARKS RETURN OF DOPE-ON-A-ROPE

MIAMI (Reuters) - The seizure of $40 million worth of
cocaine from a freighter in the Miami River marks the return
of ``dope-on-a-rope,'' a smuggling tactic used by Caribbean drug
runners in the 1980s, the U.S. Customs Service said Wednesday.

The capture of 5,137 pounds of cocaine was one of the
largest hauls in south Florida in recent years, officials told a
news conference alongside the crowded river in the heart of
Miami, with the blue-hulled freighter Isamar as a backdrop.

``South Florida is back in the narcotics trade,'' Customs
special agent Raphael Lopez said.

Agents said the discovery of the cocaine and arrest of 13
crew -- nationals of Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Venezuela
and Peru -- was the result of a year-long investigation.

The 86 bales of cocaine were packed for offloading using a
method U.S. agents refer to as dope-on-a-rope, commonplace
during the heyday of Colombian cocaine cowboys in the 1980s when
Miami was the key U.S. importation point for illicit South
American narcotics before smugglers shifted to the U.S.-Mexico
border.
Hundreds of kilo-sized (2.2-pound) bricks of cocaine were
bundled into white plastic bags trussed with rope. Individual
bundles were tied together like beads on a string, officials
said.

In the 1980s, smugglers on large ``mother ships'' would
transport the cocaine from South America to U.S. coastal waters,
where they would dump the ``dope-on-a-rope'' into the waters of
the Atlantic, officials said.

Smaller ``go-fast'' speedboats would descend on the cocaine,
bales tied together to keep them from floating in all
directions. Each boat's crew would snip off its share of the
bales and speed toward delivery points on shore.

``It has been a while since we've seen dope-on-a-rope,''
Lopez said.

Acting on intelligence reports, agents boarded the 263-foot
Panamanian-registered Isamar Friday about 40 miles south of
Haiti as it headed toward the United States from Venezuela,
officials said.

They escorted the ship to Miami, where inspectors found the
cocaine late Tuesday along with empty propane tanks in one of 35
shipping containers on the vessel.

The cocaine would be worth $39.7 million wholesale in south
Florida, officials said.

Officials said seizures of 22,000 pounds of cocaine this
year reaffirmed their belief that Colombian drug cartels shifted
back to Caribbean smuggling routes when the United States
stepped up enforcement along the California border with Mexico.

On Aug. 7, agents found 1,100 pounds of cocaine on the
Honduran freighter Apemagu at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and on July
21, 1,550 pounds were discovered on the Belize-registered Nina N
in the Miami River.

Checked-by: Richard Lake