European cocaine kingpin has high level protection in Sierra Leone

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NAIROBI/THE HAGUE: One of Europe’s most wanted fugitives, convicted cocaine trafficker Jos Lejdeckers, has received asylum and high-level protection in Sierra Leone, three sources with direct knowledge of the matter said, as seen by Reuters. According to the photos and video footage. .

The images and accounts shed fresh light on the role of the West African nation, which international law enforcement officials say is a transshipment point for large quantities of Latin American cocaine bound for Europe.

The Ledgedeckers, who are Dutch, were sentenced in absentia to 24 years in prison by a court in Rotterdam on June 25 for trafficking more than 7 tons of cocaine. He is believed to have been living in Turkey until recently, Dutch police said.

A spokesman for the Dutch prosecutors’ office told Reuters on Friday in response to questions about his whereabouts that he had been living in Sierra Leone for at least six months. Ledekker had been in Sierra Leone since at least early 2023, two sources with knowledge of the situation said.

“The top priority of the police and prosecutors is to take him to the Netherlands to serve his sentence. We are doing everything we can in this regard,” said Wim de Bruyne, a spokesman for the Dutch prosecutors’ office, declining to comment further. said

Reuters was unable to reach Leijdekkers. The Dutch judges who sentenced him noted in their judgment that he did not order a lawyer to present his defense in court. Guy Veskey, the lawyer who last represented the Ledgedeckers in Holland, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Videos and photos from a church mass in Sierra Leone on January 1, 2025 show Ledgedeckers, 33, sitting with a woman two rows behind Sierra Leone President Julius Mada Bio.

Reuters identified Ledekkers using five different facial recognition tools to compare the churchman, including a video and photos on Facebook and another video on YouTube of Ledekkers released by Europol in 2022. Seen with photos. A match, between 82 – 98% confidence.

All three sources stated that the woman was Bio’s daughter, Agnes, and that the Ledgedeckers had married her. Reuters could not confirm the relationship. Agnes Bio did not immediately respond to requests for comment sent to her email and her social media accounts. The mass was held at St. Joseph’s Catholic Church in the president’s hometown of Tihon in southern Sierra Leone.

All three sources said the Ledgedeckers enjoy a high level of protection in Sierra Leone, where they said they spend most of their time. The sources declined to be identified due to the sensitivity of the matter. Sierra Leone’s Information Minister and government spokesman Charnur Bah did not immediately respond to requests for comment sent to him via WhatsApp.

Leijdekkers is on Europol’s most wanted fugitives list.

In a wanted notice update for him on September 4, Dutch police said he was “one of the key players in international cocaine trafficking.” They said the 7,000kg cocaine shipment behind his 2024 sentence was likely part of his business.

Citing intercepted communications, Dutch police said the Leijdekkers were “potentially laundering tens of millions of euros and hundreds of kilos of gold earned from the cocaine trade”. Reuters has no independent evidence to confirm this. Over the past two decades, West Africa has become an important transit point for large quantities of cocaine trafficked from Latin America to Europe, with several large seizures of the drug recorded.

Last year, members of a UK-based crime group were jailed for trying to smuggle 1.3 tonnes of cocaine, worth £140m, into the UK from Sierra Leone. Reuters could not determine whether the Ledgedeckers were involved in the deal.

Dutch prosecutors have offered a 200,000-euro ($210,000) reward for tips leading to Leijdekkers’ arrest, the highest ever for any Dutch fugitive.