LOS ANGELES (KESQ) – A Filipino man is facing federal charges in Los Angeles for allegedly smuggling 500 pounds of cocaine on an oil tanker inbound from Ecuador to El Segundo, narcotics that were intended for a Mexican drug cartel, officials announced today.
Ceasar Tubay Gelacio Jr., 43, of the Philippines, was arrested Thursday after law enforcement directed the ship to anchor at the combined port of Los Angeles and Long Beach, where officials boarded the tanker, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.
Court papers allege that once on board, law enforcement recovered nearly 500 pounds of cocaine.
According to an affidavit, law enforcement was notified earlier this month that the Greek-owned and Liberian-flagged oil tanker Aquatravesia, whose last port of call was Ecuador, was inbound to the United States carrying a large quantity of drugs intended to be delivered to a Mexican cartel.
During the voyage, according to the DOJ, crew members discovered numerous packages hidden inside the ship’s garbage room that contained suspected narcotics. Once the ship’s captain discovered that Gelacio possessed the drugs, he secured the narcotics in a different room inside the tanker, federal prosecutors said.
Law enforcement learned that Gelacio possessed the cocaine inside the ship, had received the drugs in Ecuador, and intended to distribute them to another party while the boat was traveling past Mexico.
The captain was informed that while the Aquatravesia was in Mexican waters, small naval crafts with armed cartel members would be waiting 80 nautical miles from the shore on the evening of May 14 and early the next morning. If the drugs were not delivered at this time, additional crafts would be waiting in Mexican waters to board the oil tanker and recover the contraband, according to the complaint filed Friday in L.A. federal court.
The captain also reported receiving what he believed were radio calls from the cartel attempting to hail the Aquatravesia prior to a boarding or takeover.
If convicted of the single charged count of importation of a controlled substance, Gelacio would face between 10 years and life in federal prison, prosecutors noted.
