Kadeem Maynard was sentenced Monday in Miami federal court to just under five years in prison for his role in a scheme to traffic cocaine from Colombia through the British Virgin Islands to the U.S. mainland.
Maynard, 32, of Tortola pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to import cocaine under a plea deal reached in June and had faced anywhere from 10 years up to life in prison and a fine of up to $10 million. He will be deported from the United States upon completing his sentence.
According to a paperless “minute entry” on the court docket Monday evening, Maynard’s 57-month prison term will be followed by five years of supervised release. He also must pay a special assessment of $100 and comply with all special conditions in the pre-sentence investigation report, the details of which remain under seal.
Judge Kathleen Williams said a written judgment in the criminal case would be forthcoming.
Maynard was arrested in April 2022 along with his mother, former BVI Ports director Oleanvine Pickering Maynard, and former BVI premier Andrew Fahie following a months-long sting operation by agents with the Drug Enforcement Administration.
The trio was accused of plotting with a confidential source they believed was a member of the Mexican Sinaloa Cartel to use their government connections to provide safe passage through Tortola for tens of thousands of kilograms of cocaine to the U.S., for which they would receive millions of dollars in laundered funds, according to court documents.
The mother and son each pleaded guilty to a single cocaine smuggling conspiracy charge on June 12 and were originally scheduled to be sentenced in August. However, the date was changed to take advantage of new sentencing guidelines that went into effect on Nov. 1 that allow lesser punishments for first-time, non-violent offenders.
Pickering Maynard, 61, is now scheduled to be sentenced on Jan. 18, the same day that Fahie’s trial on cocaine smuggling and money laundering charges is to start. Both she and her son have been held at the Federal Detention Center in Miami since their arrests.
Fahie, 53, was released from federal detention on June 13, 2022 after posting two $500,000 bonds and is living at his daughters’ Miami apartment under GPS monitoring 24 hours a day, seven days a week. He is not allowed to leave the apartment except for court appearances, had to surrender his passport, and sign a worldwide waiver that he will not fight extradition should he flee.
Both Maynard and Pickering Maynard had asked the court for lighter sentences.
Maynard, who did not have a previous criminal record, claimed to have a minor role in the plot to smuggle cocaine and potentially weapons through the BVI. Prosecutors, however, have said they had secretly recorded audio evidence where he allegedly bragged about a lifetime of drug smuggling. He also allegedly asked to be partially paid in large sums of cocaine.
Maynard told the court that, unlike his mother and Fahie, he had no power to advance the alleged scheme through potential layers of government corruption. Through his lawyer, Maynard claimed to have simply introduced his mother to what he believed to be a drug cartel representative.
Pickering Maynard and Fahie were arrested at the Miami-Opa Locka Executive Airport on April 28, 2022, after stepping off a private jet they thought contained $700,000 as pre-payment for a first cocaine shipment, prosecutors said. That same day, Maynard was arrested on St. Thomas, where prosecutors said he expected to receive his first payment.
They had allegedly spent weeks in negotiations with U.S. Drug Enforcement agents posing as drug runners. Prosecutors said the $700,000 in cash was a tiny fraction of what they allegedly hoped to reap for importing hundreds of thousands of kilograms of cocaine through their British overseas territory to the U.S. mainland.
The three used code names during the alleged plot. Maynard was Blacka. Pickering Maynard was Rose or P, and Fahie was allegedly Coach or Head Coach.
