Canadian trucker nabbed with $16.5M cocaine load at border: Cops

Article content

A Canadian trucker has been arrested and charged following a massive dope bust in Port Huron.

Article content

The bust — more than 370 lbs. of cocaine with a street value of $16.5 million — is just the latest takedown at the Canadian-U.S. border involving truck drivers.

Cops say Sukjindr Singh, 29, of the Peel Region, was nabbed on Oct. 15 when he was pulled over during a traffic stop on Pine Grove Ave. in Port Huron across the St. Clair River from Sarnia.

Singh has now been charged with delivery of a controlled substance of 1,000 grams or more.

The St. Clair County Sheriff’s Office said the arrest was the biggest drug bust in the Drug Task Force’s history.

Singh was arraigned on Oct. 18 and his bond was set at $500,000. A preliminary examination is scheduled for 10 a.m. on Tuesday. If convicted, Singh faces life in an American prison and a fine of up to $1 million.

Article content

Article content

In August, 42-year-old Canadian trucker Juli Sabosan Sathiaseelan was nabbed at the Blue Water Bridge carrying 266 pounds of cocaine after the secret payload was discovered by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) agents.

He was caged on a $3 million bond at the St. Clair County Detention and Intervention Center,

“This particular vehicle was found to have an anomaly in the storage area of the tractor trailer,” Sheriff Mat King told WWJ Newsradio.

“And at that point they began manually searching the tractor and found this large amount of cocaine. And at that point we were contacted to do further investigation to find out where these drugs were going, and where they were coming from.”

Article content

Cops added that there could be additional charges.

In September, yet another Canadian trucker was arrested. This time the bust occurred in northwestern Indiana.

According to cops, Naseeb Chisty, 49, of Etobicoke was arrested in northwestern Indiana after state troopers found nearly 300 pounds of cocaine in his semi-truck during a traffic stop on I-94 near Chesterton, about an hour southeast of Chicago.

Investigators said Chisty was initially pulled over for a motor carrier violation. A K-9 unit indicated to officers alerted that drugs were present. A closer look led state troopers to discover 273.2 pounds. of cocaine in the trailer.

A field test indicated the substance was cocaine and Chisty was taken into custody. He’s facing charges of trafficking and possession of cocaine.

Article content

Other busts include:

In February, Canadian trucker Gagandeep Singh during a stop at the Ambassador Bridge in Detroit where feds seized about 661 pounds of cocaine worth $8.7 million

In May 2023, more than 132 pounds of cocaine was seized from a truck that entered Canada through Detroit over the Ambassador Bridge, and the truck’s driver, Jasbir Singh, 40, of Paris, Ont. was arrested.

Months earlier, Canadian officials seized nearly 600 pounds of suspected heroin, cocaine and methamphetamines on a truck entering Canada from Port Huron over the Blue Water Bridge. The truck’s driver, Arshdeep Singh, 23, of Quebec City, was arrested.

bhunter@postmedia.com

@HunterTOSun

Article content