Santo Domingo airport workers charged with drug smuggling

Santo Domingo airport workers charged with drug smuggling Workers at Las American International Airport in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, have been charged in connection with an alleged drug smuggling operation between the Dominican Republic and New York's Kennedy International Airport.
   U.S. authorities this week arrested 18 people in the United States and the Dominican Republic as the result of an investigation conducted by U.S. law enforcement agencies and the Dominican Republic's National Drugs Control Agency.
   According the U.S. Attorney's office in Brooklyn, the central figure in the case is a reputed drug dealer in New York's Washington Heights neighborhood on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. Henry Polanco is accused of heading up a drug smuggling operation in which two Dominican Republic-based employees of Delta Airlines allegedly hid drugs in luggage that was kept in an area away from normal inspections, then loaded the luggage on commercial flights headed for New York.
   Airport workers in New York accused of being part of the scheme then unloaded the luggage and handed the drugs over to members of the drug smuggling ring.
   The arrest came after a two-year investigation. Authorities seized more than 46 kilos of cocaine and 25 kilos of heroin before making the arrests.
   According to a report in Dominican Today, American Airline and Delta airlines cooperated by providing security videos from both cargo and passenger areas.