Derek Achong

Suri­namese busi­ness­man Ed­ward Quin­cy Muntslag will re­main in a lo­cal jail as he awaits ex­tra­di­tion to the Unit­ed States on drug traf­fick­ing charges.Chief Mag­is­trate Mar­cia Ay­ers-Cae­sar yes­ter­day re­fused Muntslag's ap­pli­ca­tion for bail which was made at his first court ap­pear­ance on Sep­tem­ber 26.

Dis­miss­ing the ap­pli­ca­tion, Ay­ers-Cae­sar, pre­sid­ing in the Port-of-Spain Eighth Court said: "Ex­tra­di­tion pro­ceed­ings dif­fer from or­di­nary crim­i­nal pro­ceed­ings to the ex­tent that there is no statu­to­ry pre­sump­tion in favour of bail for 'fugi­tive of­fend­ers'."She then ad­vised him of his right to ap­ply to a High Court judge for bail and ad­journed the case to Oc­to­ber 25.Muntslag, 29, is want­ed in the US for al­leged­ly con­spir­ing with oth­ers to traf­fic five ki­los of co­caine to the US be­tween 2011 and this year.

He was ar­rest­ed by of­fi­cers of the Or­gan­ised Crime, Nar­cotics and Firearms Bu­reau (OC­NFB) at Trinci­ty Mall on Au­gust 29, short­ly af­ter he ar­rived in Trinidad. Muntslag is co-ac­cused with Di­no De­lano Bouterse, the son of Suri­name pres­i­dent De­si Bouterse. Bouterse, who is fac­ing an ad­di­tion­al charge for pos­ses­sion of a light an­ti-tank weapon, was ar­rest­ed in Pana­ma in Au­gust and has been hand­ed over to US au­thor­i­ties.

Dur­ing yes­ter­day's hear­ing, Muntslag's lawyer, Kei­th Scot­land, re­quest­ed that the po­lice re­turn his client's per­son­al items tak­en off him when he was ar­rest­ed. Scot­land al­so said the State was yet to dis­close Muntslag's pro­vi­sion­al ex­tra­di­tion war­rant.The items in­clud­ed four gold chains, a gold bracelet, a ring, three pairs of chil­dren shoes, chil­dren's cloth­ing and three cell­phones.

Se­nior Coun­sel Is­rael Khan, who is rep­re­sent­ing the Cen­tral Au­thor­i­ty and the re­quest­ing state (US), said all the items ex­cept the cell­phone will be re­turned be­cause the po­lice in­ves­ti­ga­tion against Muntslag was still on­go­ing."There may be vi­tal in­for­ma­tion on the phones. As soon as they (phones) are cleared, they will hand­ed over. If not they will be used as ev­i­dence," Khan said.He al­so promised to dis­close the war­rant to Muntslag's le­gal team by yes­ter­day af­ter­noon.

At the start of yes­ter­day's hear­ing Ay­ers-Cae­sar opt­ed to read the charge to Muntslag for a sec­ond time, as a trans­la­tor was not avail­able dur­ing his last court ap­pear­ance.Muntslag sat in the pris­on­er en­clo­sure and lis­tened at­ten­tive­ly as trans­la­tor Za­itoen Bad­loe Klaver­wei­de trans­lat­ed Ay­ers-Cae­sar's rul­ing.Rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the Suri­name and Nether­lands diplo­mat­ic mis­sions and a group of Muntslag's rel­a­tives were al­so present.

Af­ter the brief hear­ing, Muntslag was quick­ly tak­en down­stairs, placed in a marked po­lice ve­hi­cle and tak­en to the Max­i­mum Se­cu­ri­ty Prison in Arou­ca. Muntslag is al­so be­ing pre­sent­ed by Asha Watkins-Montserin, while head of the Cen­tral Au­thor­i­ty Ne­tram Kow­lessar is ap­pear­ing along­side Khan.