DRUG SMUGGLING KINGPIN REVEALED AS INFORMANT

Sicamous Man Who Supplied Sam Brown With His Helicopter Wanted Dead
By Organized Crime Outfits

Yet another chapter in the drug smuggling saga of Sam Brown has
unfolded on the pages of a major provincial newspaper.

Late last week the Vancouver Province reported that admitted B.C.
drug kingpin Colin Martin has a contract out on his life after leaked
documents from an American court revealed he had agreed to be an
informant on other drug lords in exchange for immunity.

It was from Martin's compound near Sicamous last February that
Nelsonite Sam Brown allegedly stole the Bell 206 helicopter that he
flew across the Canada-U.S. border loaded with 200 kilos of pot -
into the middle of a DEA sting operation.

Brown later hanged himself inside a solitary cell in a Spokane County jail.

His arrest was part of a joint RCMP and DEA investigation called
Operation Blade Runner that broke up an international smuggling ring
that brought marijuana across the border in exchange for hard drugs
like cocaine and ecstasy.

American court documents uncovered by Vancouver Province deputy
editor Fabian Dawson show that Martin had offered to help the DEA
bust some major cross-border smuggling operations, and in return he
would be allowed to continue to run his business unhindered for
another 10 years.

"I got some information that this indictment had named Colin," Dawson
told The Nelson Daily News. "This was from a source within the RCMP.
And I tried looking, but it was difficult to find the document.

"I eventually found the document and decided to make some calls to
Colin and some of my sources and put the story together."

In the Grand Jury Indictment against the alleged drug smugglers,
Dawson found statements by Martin claiming he had "the ability to
control 70 per cent of the work that comes out of B.C. and what comes
into B.C." and that he "had a long history of credibility" in the
drug business, which he'd been in "for most of my adult life."

Martin offered to identify other B.C. drug lords and direct law
enforcement agencies to drug loads as long as they "only arrested
other people."

Three days before Christmas, the document containing these statements
became public knowledge after the court documents containing them
were filed in Seattle, Washington.

Then, three days after Christmas, RCMP officers came knocking on
Martin's door to tell him there was a contract out for his life.

Quoted in The Province, an RCMP spokesperson told Dawson police felt
they had a duty to inform Martin his life was in danger and that the
practice of publicly identifying informants was "absolute insanity."

There are many groups involved in the massive cross-border smuggling
ring that involves, not only drugs, but weapons like machine guns,
grenades and even rocket launchers, that would like to see Martin silenced.

This included organized crime groups like the Hell's Angels, the
United Nations Gang and the Independent Soldiers who have all used
Martin's helicopter services to move their goods.

Dawson said there are further developments expected in this story,
most of which will likely revolve around the international
ramifications of leaking confidential sources and cutting deals with
witnesses across the border.

"Subsequently there has been a lot of chatter on the (Vancouver
Province) blogs (http://communities.canada.com/theprovince/blogs) and
the RCMP have been in touch with their counterparts stateside,"
Dawson said. "They want to find out how the information got out and
secondly to see if they can get anymore information on this.

"There are several developments linked around this story and it's
expected that more of this information will come out - some of which
will be embarrassing to the American authorities," Manning said.
"Canadian authorities are going to be pretty upset about it."