Suspect in major drugs bust freed, days after second suspect dies

A 38-year-old suspect in a major drugs bust case has been set free after the legal service ruled there was not enough evidence warranting a renewal of his remand, it was reported on Saturday.

This comes two days after a main suspect, aged 61, was found dead in his cell in Limassol, with the police all but ruling out foul play.

The dead man had been arrested last week and remanded in custody for eight days.

He was being detained in connection with the discovery of 132kg of cannabis at Limassol port last month. He was the second suspect arrested following the apprehension of the 38-year-old.

During questioning the man reportedly gave the drugs squad many details on the haul, later admitting to his involvement and naming the 38-year-old as an accomplice.

The legal service reportedly ruled that even though the evidence at hand was important, it was not enough to justify keeping the younger suspect in custody until something more concrete arises. He was therefore set free on Friday.

Limassol CID officer Lefteris Kyriacou said the 61-year-old was found dead in his holding cell at around 10.15am on Thursday.

The findings of a post-mortem carried out on his body later in the day appear to rule out foul play, he added, but another post-mortem has been scheduled for Monday to ascertain the exact cause of death.

The Limassol police chief has also ordered an investigation into the incident which will involve examining CCTV footage and interrogating the officers on duty at the time of the incident.

On March 6, a container was unloaded at the port, and according to the manifest it contained 915 sacks of animal feed.

On March 8, the container was transported to a storage area at the port where, after obtaining a search warrant and in cooperation with customs, police had opened and searched it. They found 24 palettes with a number of sacks of animal feed. Hidden in two of the palettes were 132 airtight nylon packages with about 132 kilos of cannabis.

The cannabis was confiscated, and police arrested a 38-year-old man who had been convicted and previously jailed for a similar case.