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Article: U.S. Weighs Pindling Indictment; Bahamian Prime Minister Cited in Drug-Smuggling Trial
- Article from:
- The Washington Post
- Article date:
- June 25, 1988
- Author:
CopyrightThis material is published under license from the Washington Post. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Washington Post. (Hide copyright information)
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Just a month after the Reagan administration's botched attempt to
oust Panamanian leader Manuel Antonio Noriega, U.S. officials are
facing an equally thorny foreign policy dilemma: whether to pursue
evidence that Bahamian Prime Minister Lynden O. Pindling received
cash payoffs from narcotics traffickers.
Spurred by testimony in the recently concluded trial of Colombian
cocaine kingpin Carlos Lehder, Robert Merkle, the U.S. attorney for
central Florida, is investigating whether there are sufficient
grounds to indict Pindling on broad drug conspiracy charges dating to
the late 1970s, according to law enforcement sources.
But Merkle's probe, in addition to provoking a political uproar
here, ...