The crew of the Coast Guard Cutter Raymond Evans (WPC-1110) offloaded approximately 970 pounds of cocaine and 550 pounds of marijuana Thursday at Coast Guard Base Miami Beach worth an estimated total of $13.5 million wholesale seized in international waters. This featured the cutter Raymond Evans’ first-ever stop, interdiction, and seizure of a vessel trafficking illicit narcotics on April 8, 2019 while on patrol in the central Caribbean Sea.
The contraband offloaded was interdicted off the coasts of Jamaica, Haiti, and Colombia, and represented three separate cases involving suspected drug smuggling vessel interdictions by the U.S. Coast Guard:
- The cutter Raymond Evans was responsible for one case, seizing an estimated 550 pounds of marijuana.
- The Coast Guard Cutter Spencer (WMEC-905) was responsible for receiving approximately 970 pounds of cocaine from a case off the coast of Colombia. The Spencer also interdicted small amounts of marijuana and amphetamine in another case. The contraband from these cases was transferred to the Coast Guard Cutter Raymond Evans.
“This was our first deployment outside of the Florida Straits in 18 months and I’m extremely proud of my crew for the work they did over the past few weeks to make this patrol successful,” said Lt. Patrick Frost, commanding officer of the cutter Raymond Evans. “It was exciting to exercise the capabilities of the fast response cutter in the Caribbean counter-drug narcotics mission and we’re honored to have played a role in the first drug interdiction for Raymond Evans.”
The interdiction completed by the cutter Raymond Evans crew was part of a recent interagency operation to increase intelligence and targeting capabilities in order to disrupt criminal organizations in the Caribbean Sea and secure approaches to the U.S. along the southern border. The cutter Raymond Evans crew collaborated with Department of Homeland Security components to interdict suspected drug smugglers off the coast of Jamaica.
