A hunt is on for the suspected ‘commander’ of the four-member racket that was busted with 350 grams of MDMA in an operation by the special action team of the Ernakulam Excise Enforcement Assistant Commissioner on Friday night.
Susymol M. Sunny aka Thumbipennu, 24, of Chingavanam in Kottayam, Ameer Suhail, 23, of Chengamanad, Ajmal K.A. aka Ajippai, 24, of Malippuram South, and Elroy Varghese, 21, of Angamaly were nabbed from Stadium Link Road as they turned up for an alleged deal.
During interrogation, the accused reportedly referred to one Sachin of Kollam and who went by the name ‘Commander.’ He was allegedly the one who sourced the drug, dubbed ‘Himalayan Meth,’ from Himachal Pradesh. Packaged in a polythene cover and made to look like a garbage pack, the drug was dumped near the Kochi airport following which the ‘commander’ sent the exact location of the package to Susymol who reportedly ran the racket using her alleged contacts with criminal elements.
“Susymol and Ameer delivered the drug to clients, while Ajmal and Elroy helped them find potential clients using their criminal background. Both of them had several criminal cases against them with Elroy being particularly dangerous. Clients solicited by them approached Susymol who weighed the drug and delivered it from inside a car,” said Excise sources.
They reportedly sold MDMA for anywhere between ₹4,000 and ₹7,000 per gram. They claimed that a well-entrenched racket was functional in Himachal Pradesh for arranging the drugs. Once the drugs were sold, the payment was made using a QR code shared by the ‘commander’ who then duly paid the racket the commission.
The car seized by the Excise during the operation reportedly had knives, including foreign-made ones. The Ernakulam Deputy Excise Commissioner B. Tenimon and Enforcement Assistant Commissioner T.N. Sudheer interrogated the accused before they were produced before the court and duly remanded into judicial custody on Saturday.
“We have already filed the custody application for the accused. We are confident of securing more evidence against them,” said Mr. Sudheer.
