Former BVI Premier Andrew Fahie’s cocaine smuggling and money laundering trial set for January 18

Kadeem Maynard, who was arrested along with former British Virgin Islands Premier Andrew Fahie in 2022 on drug trafficking and money laundering charges, has been sentenced to 57 months in jail.

Judge Kathleen Williams sentenced the 32-year-old Tortola resident to 4.75 years on Monday, November 20, in a Miami Federal Court in the United States.

In June, Maynard, also known as “Blacka”, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to import cocaine in a Miami federal court. He struck a plea deal with federation prosecutors to avoid serving 10 years to life and a maximum fine of $10 million.

At his sentencing, he was also ordered to comply with all special conditions listed in the plea deal, including paying a special assessment fee of $100 and five years of supervised release. On completion of his sentence, he will be deported from the United States.

Maynard claimed that he played a minor role in the alleged scheme involving smuggling narcotics and potentially weapons through the BVI.

Through his legal representation, he acknowledged introducing his mother to the Drug Enforce Administration (DEA) agent, posing as a representative of a drug cartel. He told the court that he lacked the authority to move the alleged smuggling scheme through various levels of government.

But federal prosecutors countered that Maynard was captured on audio evidence recorded by the undercover agent boasting about a long history of drug smuggling, and allegedly requesting partial payment in significant amounts of cocaine.

The DEA affidavit stated that the informant posing as a representative of the Mexican Sinaloa Cartel to the United States mainland met with Maynard and her son Kadeem in March 2022 on Tortola and St Thomas, United States Virgin Islands.

The discussion focused on using the territory’s ports to ship thousands of kilos of cocaine from Colombia to Miami and New York via Puerto Rico; each kilogram would be sold for between US$26,000 and US$38,000.

And for looking the other way, they would receive a percentage of the monies made from the sale of the narcotics. According to court documents, the ex-Ports  Authority Managing Director explained the payouts will be hidden in shell companies and she would easily process the paperwork “so you can come into the territory for a couple days, and then move on.” While Fahie agreed to the arrangement for ten percent of the proceeds.

“You see my premier, he’s a little crook sometimes,” Maynard told the DEA confidential source, according to the affidavit.

Pickering Maynard and Fahie were arrested at the Miami-Opa Locka Executive Airport in Florida on April 28, 2022, while Kadeem Maynard was detained in St Thomas, United States Virgin Islands and later deported to the United States mainland.

The trio were charged with conspiring to import more than five kilos of cocaine into the United States and conspiring to launder $700,000.

But while Fahie, the former First Electoral District Representative and chairman of the Virgin Islands Party, was granted one million dollars bail – $500,000 cash and $500,00 surety – and lives in his daughters’ two-bedroom apartment in Florida with an ankle monitor, the Maynards have remained in Federal Detention Center in Miami since their arrest which made global headlines.

The 61-year-old Pickering Maynard, who also struck a deal with the prosecution to avoid a lengthy sentence and hefty fine, is on file to be sentenced on January 18 – the same day former BVI Premier Fahie’s cocaine smuggling and money laundering trial is set to start.

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