Homeland Security Investigations has announced that Brahmananda Prasad, of Queens, New York, has been sentenced to prison following an intensive HSI investigation into a nationwide cocaine trafficking operation. The conspiracy was responsible for transporting 956 kilograms of cocaine from California to the East Coast for further distribution.
U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika sentenced Prasad, 65, to 275 months in prison for his leadership role in the scheme. The court also ordered the confiscation of $2,495,500, which represented the gross proceeds of Prasad’s cocaine trafficking organization.
“This sentence sends a clear message to those who would attempt to profit from poisoning our communities with dangerous drugs,” said Nathan Abel, acting Special Agent in Charge of HSI Philadelphia. “Through relentless investigative work and excellent collaborations with our law enforcement counterparts, HSI disrupted a coast-to-coast trafficking enterprise that was flooding the East Coast with massive amounts of cocaine. We remain committed to holding traffickers accountable and protecting our communities from the catastrophic effects of drug distribution.”
According to court documents and evidence given at the sentencing hearing, Prasad arranged a coast-to-coast cocaine trafficking network by traveling from New York to California several times to pick up huge amounts of cocaine from suppliers. On each journey, he purchased between 20 and 24 kilograms of cocaine, on some occasions acquiring up to 48 kilograms at once.
Prasad arranged for the drugs to be shipped from California to New York, instructing others to act as representatives of a supposedly genuine shipping company in order to avoid detection by law enforcement police. After the cocaine arrived on the East Coast, Prasad distributed it to drug dealers in New York and Maryland. These dealers transported the hazardous narcotic to Delaware and other states along the East Coast.
This investigation is part of a Homeland Security Task Force initiative. The HSTF is a US government cooperation focused on combating criminal cartels, transnational gangs, and transnational criminal organizations around the world. This project exposes TCOs involved in a variety of criminal schemes that violate federal law, while also destroying cross-border human smuggling and trafficking networks that fuel violence and instability, endangering the safety and security of the United States and its global partners. It also prioritizes criminal offenses against minors and requires the use of all available law enforcement instruments to prosecute offenders and/or aid the removal of illegal aliens from the United States. HSTF Philadelphia is made up of agents from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, ICE HSI, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Pennsylvania, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Delaware, the DEA, the ATF, IRS-CI, the U.S. Marshals Service, the Liberty Mid-Atlantic High The prosecution was led by the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Delaware.
Leave a Reply