
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, May 15, 1993                   TAG: 9305150074
SECTION: NATL/INTL                    PAGE: A-2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE: SEATTLE                                LENGTH: Short

FEDS CRACK U.S. SOLDIERS' COCAINE RING

Army soldiers used military transport planes to smuggle more than 200 pounds of cocaine into the United States from Panama, authorities said.

Three of 11 people charged in a federal indictment have been arrested, prosecutors said Thursday. Those arrested are current or former soldiers who were stationed at Fort Lewis, near Tacoma, Wash.

Spot inspections revealed the shipment method when 4.4 pounds of cocaine was found in the false sides of a briefcase carried by a passenger who arrived at Charleston, S.C., on a October 1990 military flight bound for Fort Lewis from Panama.

Cocaine from the ring, based in Colon, Panama, was brought to Tacoma, and sent by courier to New York, Miami, Los Angeles and other destinations, LaDage said.

- Associated Press

by CNB