On Nov 13, 9:42 am, "Roger Long" wrote:
Joe,

Here's another thing to consider about a boarding situation. There isn't a
boarding officer alive who, finding a 41 foot sailboat stuffed to the gills
with coffee, isn't going to jump, quite reasonably, to the conclusion that
at least one of the bags contains the coke that is actually paying for the
trip. In these days when any document can be produced with PhotoShop and a
computer, the paperwork isn't going to be worth much more than the paper in
the head. They are going to want to see inside every single bag, probably
by dumping it on the cabin floor.

Here's one of my Coast Guard stories:

I get a frantic call from a client whose 58 foot fiberglass fishing boat I
designed. The boat is hove to on Georges Bank with the crew sitting on the
deck, hands clasped behind their heads, and a 19 year old with an automatic
rifle pointed at them. A cutter is standing by with the 50 caliber trained
on the pilothouse. The boat has a plywood web frame just forward of the
collision bulkhead. In order to provide good drainage and put a little
extra beef at the point where the stem might hit a floating object, we put
in a small triangular block of foam at the bottom, poured resin around it,
and then glassed it over. The volume of the whole thing was less than a
cubic foot.

One of the boarding party looked through the small access hatch, saw the
small flat portion of floor, and said, "Ah Ha! Secret compartment." They
weren't going anywhere until they saw inside. Gaining access meant cutting
a large opening in the collision bulkhead so they wanted the boat and crew
to remain hove to for twelve hours while a chainsaw was sent out by another
cutter. Your tax dollars at work, a medium endurance cutter and crew
transporting a chainsaw to look for less than 1 cubic foot of dope. Sitting
with your hands locked behind your neck for twelve hours while missing the
pay for half a fishing day is pretty grim. The one sign of sense the
boarding party showed was letting the captain make a radio call.

The owner of this boat wasn't just anybody. He was the co-owner of the
waterfront centerpiece Marine Trade Center in his home port with a fleet
right across from the Coast Guard Base. They could look out the windows and
see his boats. I printed up a copy of the construction plan for him and he
rushed off with it to the Coast Guard. Four hours later, he secured
agreement to have the compartment cut into under USCG supervision at a
shipyard upon the vessel's scheduled return. The key was pointing out that,
if the Coast Guard couldn't get into it, the crew couldn't either. By the
time the boat returned, common sense had prevailed, face had been saved, and
someone quietly agreed that it would be silly to send a bunch of police,
customs, FDA, state drug enforcement agents, and local news reporters (which
I'm sure the owner was savvy enough to point out he would call) to watch a
Geraldo Rivera moment on a small block of foam.

All that saved my client a nightmare as the difficulty of getting into the
space and the fact that the USCG didn't have a chainsaw on board the cutter.
Think how easy it will be for them to open all those coffee bags.

"OK Sir, you are free to put the coffee back in the bags and proceed on your
way. Have a good day."

--
Roger Long



Roger speaks the truth !


If it walks like a duck and quacks (probable cause)............. youre
screwed! Or as our girls and boys in blue are trained to belive "...
what would a reasonable person assume when looking at a "recreational"
sailboat stuffed with bags of commerce leaving a known drug exporting
area?
Bob