HECTOR’S RIVER, Portland — One person has been taken into custody in connection with Thursday evening’s $10-million drug bust in this coastal parish. One man escaped but the Area Two narcotics police are leading an investigation with the expectation of making more arrests.

The bust has been hailed as a major blow to the illicit drugs for guns trade.

During a targeted raid of two houses in the community of Belle Castle, the police seized 2,000 pounds of compressed ganja.

“Two dwelling houses were searched and in one house 20 plastic bags containing knitted bags filled with parcels of compressed ganja were found inside. One man exited the house and ran on the approach of the police and made good his escape. The other house had 33 black plastic bags filled parcels of compressed ganja,” commanding officer for the Portland Division Superintendent Kenneth Chin told the media on Friday. “The seizure represents over 260 parcels of ganja which were packaged for export.”

The raids took place between 3:45 pm and 7:00 pm on Thursday.

“Our intelligence suggests that this seizure will cause another major dent in the guns for drugs trade as we had a similar seizure of over 3,300 pounds in May of this year,” said Chin who recently assumed command of the parish’s police. He commended lawmen from Portland and Area 2 narcotics division for “going beyond and above the call of duty in executing this operation”, adding that every effort will be made to “continue to target the criminal elements who are bent on tarnishing the reputation of the parish”.

Meanwhile, Chin stressed that the drug bust was not linked to the four Haitians who drifted ashore on Tuesday. Their 20-foot boat, he said, would not have been able to accommodate such a large haul and the men’s physical state would have also made their involvement doubtful. Those who helped the fishermen ashore had told the Observer that they were in poor shape.