A 26-year-old tele­vi­sion cam­era­man was sen­tenced on Tues­day to three-and-a-half years in prison for mar­i­jua­na traf­fick­ing. Rus­sell Bas­deo, of McKen­zie Street, Fred­er­ick Set­tle­ment, Ca­roni, re­ceived the sen­tence af­ter be­ing found guilty by Se­nior Mag­is­trate Cher­ril-Anne Blake in the Tu­na­puna First Court.Bas­deo was ar­rest­ed on Sep­tem­ber 21, 2011 by mem­bers of the North East­ern Di­vi­sion Task Force (NEDTF), led by Sgt Roger Alexan­der and Sunil Bharath.

Bas­deo, then em­ployed with Cen­tral-based tele­vi­sion sta­tion WINTV, was dri­ving the com­pa­ny's white Nis­san Almera near Grand Bazaar, Uri­ah-But­ler High­way, when it was in­ter­cept­ed.Po­lice said Bas­deo was sit­ting on the par­cel of mar­i­jua­na which was wrapped in plas­tic.The charge was laid by PC John­son of the NEDTF.