Shaniqwa O’Brien and Desiree Burrows were charged in Bermuda’s Magistrates’ Court on 1 February 2011 with conspiring to import cannabis resin on 8 January and on another date unknown.[1] Both were also charged with possessing cannabis resin with intent to supply in St George’s on 8 January, and both pleaded not guilty; their lawyer was Larry Scott.[1] Bernews, reporting the same hearing, gave their ages as O’Brien 20 and Burrows 21, and said the Crown alleged they conspired between a date unknown and 8 January 2011 with others not before the court to import resin.[2]

Magistrate Archibald Warner released each woman on $10,000 bail; the Royal Gazette said they were to return to court on 15 February, while Bernews gave 16 February.[1] The court did not read out the quantity of resin or its value at that hearing.[1] The Royal Gazette said six women had by then been charged that year with conspiring to bring drugs to the island, two of whom had pleaded guilty.[1]

The pair had arrived on a charter flight from Jamaica on 8 January 2011 and were sent for a secondary customs search at LF Wade International Airport, where officers found no drugs in their luggage.[3] Both refused an X-ray and denied having swallowed drugs, so police were called and the women were taken to King Edward VII Memorial Hospital, where they passed pellets of cannabis resin said to weigh 141.5 grams each.[3] The court heard the 282 grams of resin, 141.5 grams each, would have sold for $28,300 on Bermuda’s streets, and that the women had been offered $5,000 to bring in the drugs.[4]

Both pleaded guilty before Senior Magistrate Archibald Warner on 15 February 2011, and he jailed them for 18 months each, to begin immediately.[5] The Crown offered no evidence on the possession with intent to supply charge.[5]