 | A Metro Vancouver man has been handed a hefty sentence down under for smuggling 29 kilograms of cocaine and pre-cursor chemicals into Australia. Eric Lawrence, 32, was sentenced last week to 14 years and must serve a minimum eight years and five months in jail before being eligible for parole. Lawrence was arrested last year with four kilograms of cocaine and 25 of pseudoephedrine, a chemical used in the manufacturing of methamphetamine. Information leading to his arrest came from a lengthy joint investigation between the Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit of B.C. and Australian Federal Police. The case also overlapped with the Surete du Quebec’s Project Loquace, which led to drug importation charges against B.C. gangsters Larry Amero, Shane Maloney and Rabih Alkhalil. |
 Larry Amero |  Shane Kenneth Maloney |  Rabih Alkhalil |
 | Project Loquace was a major operation that mobilized more than 1,000 officers in Quebec, Ontario and B.C. Police executed pre-dawn raids in late 2012 looking for 128 suspects. The arrests of 103 of them were also connected to a weapons case involving a massive cache of firearms and stolen dynamite. Larry Amero is alleged to be one of six kingpins in a “consortium” that united different crime groups in their move into the Quebec illicit drug market. The consortium was able to sell 75 kilograms of cocaine a week, netting $50-million in revenues in a span of six months" |
 Police recovered 1,486 sticks of dynamite. | Police also recovered 161 firearms. Officers have seized $255,000 in cash, 46,100 methamphetamine pills, 153 kilograms of cocaine, nine kilograms of cannabis and 13 barrels of gamma-butyrolactone (GBL), a chemical precursor used to manufacture GHB. They also seized 35 vehicles and had court orders blocking five residences worth a total of $1.4-million. |  |
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/police-dismantle-cross-country-gang-ring/article4809948/
 | "Police are still looking for four of the six men they considered leaders of the operation: Mihale Leventis, Frédéric Lavoie, Rabih Alkhalil and Timoleon Psiharis." |  |
 Frederic Lavoie | El Tiempo newspaper reported that the body of Quebec City native Frederic Lavoie, 31, was found on May 12, 2014 in the town of Sabaneta, 300 km northwest of the capital, Bogota. His remains were found on a street inside four garbage bags that were leaking blood. He was among more than 100 people sought by provincial police in a massive anti-drug operation launched in 2012 against bikers, the Mafia and their associates. Lavoie's accomplice, Timoleon Psiharis, 29, was tortured, doused with acid and beaten to death in Greece in 2012. |  Timoleon Psiharis |
