THE police yesterday detained eight persons, some described as extremely close to Christopher ‘Dudus’ Coke, as they shifted their focus to the more affluent communities of St Andrew in an effort to apprehend the man whom United States authorities have described as one of the world’s most dangerous drug kingpins.

Coke is wanted in the US on drug and gun-running charges.

Five men and three women were early yesterday afternoon carted away by a joint police/military team that raided the house in the upscale community of Sterling Glades in Kirkland Heights, just hours before.

The men, all wearing white T-shirts or tank tops, were placed on the verandah, their hands bound behind them, as members of the security forces searched the sprawling house.

Inspector Steve Brown of the Constabulary Communication Network said that the police had gone to the premises based upon information that Coke had taken refuge there since fleeing Tivoli Gardens last week during an incursion by the military that resulted in the deaths of 73 civilians and a soldier.

All those detained were of West Kingston addresses and at least one of the men had been detained during last week’s raid on Coke’s former stronghold.

“We got information that the subject was in the area and came here. But the subject is not here. Two of the persons [here] are very close to the subject and are of keen interest to us,” Brown said.

A Honda motor car and several documents were seized from the house, Brown said.

An elderly person and four children were also in the house, which is not owned by Coke, Brown said.

Residents must have been startled when they woke up yesterday morning to see the large contingent of security personnel, who came in a Jamaica Defence Force truck, three sports utility vehicles, a jeep and a pick-up van.

Some could be seen gazing through their half opened doors while others watched from their balconies. At one point, one of the women who was detained got involved in a shouting match with security personnel.

A policeman could be seen using a camera phone to photograph the tattoos of some of the men in the group.

“You see where they are moving into now?” Brown asked rhetorically, before answering, “in the wealthy communities where people mind their own business.”

Just last week an operation by the joint police/military forces to apprehend Coke, not far from Sterling Glades, resulted in the fatal shooting of accountant Keith Clarke, the brother of former People’s National Party minister Claude Clarke and an in-law of children’s advocate Mary Clarke.

The cops involved in that operation have been taken off front-line duty.