A US judge sentenced Jamaican drug lord Christopher “Dudus” Coke to 23 years in prison yesterday, ending a long struggle to lock up a powerful figure who had evaded capture with the aid of Jamaican authorities.
Coke (43) was given the maximum sentence at the District Court in Manhattan after a deal in which he pleaded guilty in August 2011 to drug trafficking and assault charges. Since the early 1990s Coke had led a group who distributed marijuana, cocaine and crack cocaine throughout the world, the US justice department said.
Jamaica’s prime minister had fought US attempts to extradite Coke in 2009 for more than a year before agreeing to hand him over. In the police assault to take him into custody at Tivoli Gardens, Kingston, in June 2010, 73 people were killed. – (Reuters)