Court hints at political patronage in police-drug nexus
By IANSFriday, June 4, 2010
PANAJI - The Goa government is unwilling to hand over the police-drug mafia probe to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) as “more skeletons may tumble out from the cupboard of the police-drug dealers nexus”, the Panaji bench of the Bombay High Court has observed.
In what could be construed as an indictment of a section of Goa’s political class, Justice N.A. Britto Thursday said: “Is there anyone in Goa not connected with the police, drug dealers and politicians, who does not believe that this nexus exists only because of political patronage?”
The judge, while hearing the bail application plea of a police inspector linked to the drug mafia in Goa, also said that the police were unwilling to get to the bottom of the high profile probe, in which a son of a senior minister is linked.
“If the police department can send police inspectors north and east to investigate a simple case of attempted suicide, the police department could have certainly sent a responsible Indian Police Service (IPS) officer to record the statement of Atala’s friend,” Justice Britto said.
Swedish model Lucky Farmhouse, a former girlfriend of Israeli drug dealer Yaniv Benaim alias Atala, has alleged that she has spy camera videos which shows the son of a leading politician conducting dealings with the drug mafia in Goa.
Other videos, uploaded by Lucky on www.youtube.com and showing Atala boasting of his links to policemen and politicians, had triggered a domino effect, with the arrest of seven policemen and Atala himself.
“The lady (Lucky) is stated to have said that she has video footage of Atala’s dealings with the police and that she also has video footage of a Goan politician’s son coming to collect money from him, etc. Till date, her statement has not been recorded,” Justice Britto observed.
–Indo Asian News Service
