NIGERIAN NARCOTICS TRAFFICKER AND RUSSIAN PILOT
CONVICTED ON INTERNATIONAL COCAINE CONSPIRACY CHARGES
IN MANHATTAN FEDERAL COURT

Two Defendants Convicted For Conspiring To Traffic More Than $100
Million Worth Of Cocaine In Culmination Of Historic Joint
Undercover Operation In Republic Of Liberia

PREET BHARARA, the United States Attorney for the
Southern District of New York, announced that CHIGBO PETER UMEH
and KONSTANTIN YAROSHENKO, participants in an international
narcotics trafficking ring, were convicted today in Manhattan
federal court of conspiring to import cocaine into the United
States. Their convictions are the culmination of a historic,
joint undercover operation, "Operation Relentless," between the
United States and the Republic of Liberia. The jury acquitted
defendants NATHANIEL FRENCH and KUDUFIA MAWUKO, who had been
charged along with UMEH and YAROSHENKO. United States District
Judge JED S. RAKOFF presided over the three week trial.

Manhattan U.S. Attorney PREET BHARARA stated: "Today's
guilty verdicts against Chigbo Peter Umeh and Konstantin
Yaroshenko deal a blow to the international drug trade and
demonstrate the power of global cooperation. The DEA's bold
undercover operation, aided by the Republic of Liberia and our
other law enforcement partners abroad, succeeded in disrupting a
dangerous network of South American-based narcotics traffickers,
who conspired to exploit West African countries as trans-shipment
hubs for tons of cocaine. As a result of unprecedented
international teamwork among the U.S., Liberia and other nations,
this Office was able to prosecute these pushers of poison and
bring them to justice."

According to the trial evidence and other documents
filed in the case:

During the last decade, drug trafficking organizations
based in South America have increasingly used countries along or
near the West African coast as trans-shipment hubs for importing

massive quantities of cocaine to be later distributed in Europe
or elsewhere within Africa. Through a combination of privately
owned aircraft and maritime vessels, these organizations,
predominantly based in Colombia and Venezuela, have transported
hundreds of tons of cocaine, worth billions of dollars, to places
such as Guinea Bissau, Guinea Conakry, Sierra Leone, Togo, Mali,
Ghana, Nigeria, and Liberia. In so doing, representatives of
these drug trafficking organizations have often sought to bribe
high-level public officials with large cash payments and
narcotics in order to ensure the safe passage, storage, and
distribution of their cocaine shipments.

UMEH and YAROSHENKO attempted to bribe high-level
officials in the Liberian Government, in order to protect
shipments of vast quantities of cocaine, and to use Liberia as a
trans-shipment point for further distribution of the cocaine in
Africa and Europe. In particular, UMEH met with two individuals
he knew to be Liberian government officials. These two
officials, the Director and Deputy Director of the Republic of
Liberia National Security Agency ("RLNSA", both of whom were in
fact were working with the DEA in an undercover capacity. The
Director of the RLNSA is also the son of the current President of
Liberia. In a number of the meetings involving these Liberian
officials, UMEH and YAROSHENKO also met with a confidential
source working with DEA (the "CS", who purported to be a
business partner and confidante of the Director of the RLNSA.

In seeking to ensure the safe passage of the cocaine
shipments, UMEH and YAROSHENKO agreed to make payments to the
Director and the Deputy Director of the RLNSA in cash and also in
the form of cocaine. The CS advised them that a portion of the
cocaine paid to the CS would be transported from Liberia to
Ghana, from where it would be imported into New York.

UMEH, who is from Nigeria, was a broker who assisted
various international narcotics suppliers in shipping numerous
tons of cocaine from South America to West Africa, from where the
cocaine was transported to Europe or elsewhere within Africa.
YAROSHENKO, who is from Russia, was an aircraft pilot and
aviation transport expert who transported thousand-kilogram
quantities of cocaine throughout South America, Africa, and
Europe.

UMEH and YAROSHENKO participated in a series of face-
to-face meetings and phone conversations with the cooperating
Liberian officials and the CS in connection with at least three
different shipments of cocaine that they were trying to transport
through Liberia: (1) a shipment of approximately 4,000 kilograms,

-2-

which was to be flown from Venezuela to Monrovia, Liberia, and
the retail value of which was over $100 million; (2) a shipment
of approximately 1,500 kilograms, which was to be flown from
Venezuela to Monrovia, Liberia, on an aircraft originating in
Panama; and (3) a shipment of approximately 500 kilograms of
cocaine, which was to be transported by a ship from Venezuela to
a location off the coast of Liberia. Through these meetings,
they understood that once the cocaine was transported to Liberia,
a portion of the shipment (representing the payment to the CS)
would be transported into Ghana, from where it would be placed on
a commercial flight destined for the United States.

During a meeting in Monrovia, UMEH stated that the
4,000 kilograms of cocaine which the conspiracy intended to
import into Liberia had been supplied and protected by the
Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (the "FARC". The
FARC is an international terrorist group dedicated to the violent
overthrow of the democratically elected Government of Colombia.

On May 28 and 29, 2010, UMEH and YAROSHENKO were
arrested in Liberia. They were transferred by the Government of
Liberia to the custody of the United States to face trafficking
charges in the Southern District of New York. JORGE IVAN SALAZAR
CASTANO and MARCEL ACEVEDO SARMIENTO were also charged with UMEH
and YAROSHENKO. SALAZAR CASTANO is incarcerated in Spain and
ACEVEDO SARMIENTO is in Colombia, awaiting extradition to the
United States.

*

*

UMEH, 43, faces a mandatory
prison, and a maximum term of life in
faces a mandatory minimum term of ten
maximum term of life in prison. They
sentenced by Judge RAKOFF on July 28,

Mr. BHARARA praised the work of the Special Operations
Division of the DEA, the DEA Lagos Country Office, the DEA Warsaw
Country Office, the DEA Bogota Country Office, the DEA Rome
Country Office, the U.S. Department of Justice Office of
International Affairs, and the U.S. State Department. He also
thanked the U.S. Embassy in Liberia, the Republic of Liberia and
its National Security Agency, and the Security Services of
Ukraine for their efforts.

This prosecution is being handled by the Office's
Terrorism and International Narcotics Unit. Assistant United
States Attorneys JENNA M. DABBS, CHRISTOPHER LAVIGNE, RANDALL
JACKSON, and MICHAEL M. ROSENSAFT are in charge of the
prosecution.

*

minimum term of 20 years in
prison. YAROSHENKO, 42,
years in prison, and a
are scheduled to be
2011, at 4:00 p.m.

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