SWALLOWERS

Constable Aaron Sheedy
Toronto, Ontario

There can be no other way to look at it. The “Super Loo” brings clarity to the fact that there isn’t much further to slip in one’s life.

Deep in the bowels of Terminal One at the Lester B. Pearson International Airport in Toronto are the RCMP cells; and at the very back of the cells is the stainless steel plumbing contraption known as the Super Loo. Looking at this device, you wouldn’t immediately come the conclusion that it is in fact a toilet; a toilet with the sole purpose of filtering swallowed drug packages from the excrement of the courier. The device is a case of function-murdering fashion in cold blood. There is nothing at all redeeming or complimentary about its looks.

All the surfaces are a cold stainless steel. The bowl, as such it is, is a square hole that leads to an internal stainless steel chamber where the drug packages are collected. This chamber has two holes that are covered by industrial rubber gloves that allow sterile access to the drugs in the chamber. The plumbing for the Super Loo is mounted on the outside of the wall for easy access because everything leaks all the time. Needless to say, when a drug courier mounts the Super Loo to do their business, the Mountie on duty isn’t witnessing the courier’s finest hour. And don’t think that Mountie isn’t having a gut-check on his or her career choice either. The drug packages still have to be retrieved; the system is far from automatic.

In late 2002, I was posted to the Federal Enforcement Section (FES) at the Toronto Airport Detachment. We were responsible for the Lester B. Pearson International Airport. It was my first post in the RCMP. Quickly my eyes were opened to the lengths people would go to bring drugs into Canada; I dealt with scores of couriers and investigated every imaginable importation method. Our counterparts at the Canada Border Services Agency were making bust after bust, night after night. It fell to our little section to seize the dope, deal with the couriers, do the investigations, and take the cases to court. In the early days there were many around-the-clock shifts.

Also in those days, the Super Loo was used daily.

Typically drug couriers aren’t sophisticated criminals. Largely, they get paid to take the risk of getting caught at the border. Whether the drugs are tied to their bodies, hidden in food or constructed into false sides of suitcases, they have come to a point in their life where they are willing to take the risk of years in jail for about three thousand dollars.

But someone who is willing to swallow a half kilogram of cocaine in a hundred, five gram pellets to be crapped out later is a whole different level of desperate. Swallowers are, in my mind, very much criminals, selfishly bringing in drugs that destroy lives for their own profit, but they’re also, to some degree, victims.

It typically takes three days for a swallower to pass all their pellets. During that time, they stay at the RCMP cells at Pearson Airport. Because of the length of stay and the nature of their incarceration (multiple supervised trips to the Super Loo), there are lots of opportunities to get to know the prisoners. There are several memorable interactions with swallowers that come to mind.

There was one man who was very forthcoming about his knowledge of the drug importation rings in Toronto. As I walked him down the hall to the Super Loo, we were discussing the merits and detractions to the various importation methods available. He positioned himself on the Super Loo and prepared to make his deposit. He paused, looked at me thoughtfully and said, “I really think all the smart people are swallowing.” It was all I could do not to laugh out loud.

There was the man who insisted on doing his business entirely naked. We strongly suggested that he at least wear his shoes, but no. He could only “go” naked. So three or four times an hour, he took the walk to the Loo, without any shame whatsoever, in his birthday suit.

Sadly, we were regulars at the Etobicoke General Hospital and I am sure the nurses, x-ray techs, and doctors have their share of swallower stories. In my time, there were at least six swallowers who had emergency surgery to have obstructed pellets removed from their bowels. Some like to simplify the risk of what will happen to a person if five grams of almost pure cocaine is released in their digestive track by saying, “It is the risk they took.” But when you witness it first hand and are present for their last words, and then explain it all to their loved ones, that risk becomes pretty one-sided.

One weekend in the summer of 2003, we were doing our usual shift at Pearson.We had three swallowers at once all of whom were on the same flight arriving from Jamaica.

Martin and Shawn were arriving in Canada as part of the Farm Worker Program.This program is a win-win situation for the participants. The farm owners get labour at a rate that is more affordable than Canadian wages and the workers get wages that are better than what they get at home, often being able to support their families for the year with the wages they get from the few months of harvest in Canada.

Martin was a preacher at his local church and, by being part of the Farm Worker Program, didn’t need to search out other work in Jamaica. He would also pastor the other workers while in Canada. He was considered one of the leaders of the group.

Shawn was a family man. He had two kids and a wife, and prided himself on being able to take care of them by doing this work. He had been doing it for eight years.

We immediately keyed in on the pair. We knew if two of the most experienced workers were importing, there had to be others; there would have to be an overseer who was in charge of everything, and who had likely arrived with them. There would have to be a plan to afford the group of swallowers the privacy to pass their pellets over the next couple of days and pass the drugs off to someone here in Canada. This was very much a crime in progress.

As we interviewed the pair, we did everything we could to drive the weight of their crime home. We were betting that they were good people who had had a horrible lapse in judgment. We showed them every angle of their mistake—the risk to them, their families, to their reputations—in the hopes that they would try to make it right and put us on the trail of the other criminals. By the end of the interviews they were exhausted. Shawn, in particular, was a mess.

In 2003, the RCMP cells were in the old Terminal One at Pearson Airport. These facilities were far from modern. The cellblock was one row. There were five or six rooms including the three cells, the interview room, and the Super Loo at the end of the hall. It was cramped, it smelled, and sounds of Shawn sobbing uncontrollably echoed loudly throughout the cellblock. I can only imagine the fear that Marcus felt as he was marched in and given his requisite tour of the Super Loo.

Marcus was younger, a nineteen-year-old Canadian living in Toronto. He had family in Jamaica and was down there for a funeral, or that is what he told the border services officer who interviewed him. It didn’t take long for Marcus to talk himself into a corner and end up admitting that he swallowed drugs. Marcus wasn’t dumb, he wasn’t really even that simple. I was having a hard time understanding how he came to be a drug swallower. Marcus was lodged into the cell right beside Shawn. Shawn’s cries echoed through the entire cellblock.

By the next day, Shawn’s sobs had decreased in volume but were still pretty much full-time. There was a constant rotation up and down the hall between the three prisoners. Neither Martin nor Marcus complained about the constant noise despite having good cause to.

I can’t say we were sorry we took the statement—the people of Canada have a right to have crimes against them investigated aggressively—but we did feel some responsibility for the derailment of Shawn’s condition. We decided to do what we could. We tried several things but none of them worked. I could hear through his sobs that he was praying, which was more of a pleading really so we brought him a copy of the Bible, but he couldn’t read. That idea was a bust. We put music on in the cell hallway. We brought tea, we tried to talk to him and discuss the court process that he faced with the hope that, if he understood what was going to happen, he might calm down. None of it worked.

We came to the conclusion that this had gone on long enough and that perhaps the airport nurse should become involved. She came and left refusing to provide any medication because she didn’t know what reaction it may have with the possible cocaine in his system.

It had been almost two solid days.

My partner had the idea of putting him in touch with a loved one in Jamaica. I was up for the idea; perhaps a friendly voice would do the trick. It made matters even worse. It ended in even more uncontrolled sobbing. My partner was on the phone for fifteen minutes explaining to Shawn’s panicked wife that he was safe and that everything was being done to get the drugs out safely. What a disaster.

Through this whole time Marcus remained quiet, didn’t ask for anything and did everything we asked of him.

Finally Martin and Shawn had passed all their pellets and it was time to transfer them into the court system. It was the middle of the night and we’re almost certain the receiving jail wouldn’t accept Shawn in his current state. We were discussing taking him to the hospital, when Martin banged on his door. “Let me talk to him,” he said in his heavy Jamaican accent.

We theorized it couldn’t go worse than the call home so we allowed Martin into Shawn’s cell. Shawn immediately started to wail about his wife, his kids, and how he was in trouble with the police. Martin startled us when he yelled at Shawn.

“Is God going to forgive you?” Shawn tried to keep crying. Martin demanded again, “Will God forgive you?”

Shawn squeaked out a, “Yes.”

“Then no man should hold the grudge. It is time to go set this right.” said Martin.

Shawn pulled himself together and didn’t shed another tear. We all took some quiet time. The only sound was a quiet, “Amen.” from Marcus’ cell when everyone realized that the sobbing was over.

The next night I relieved the day shift. Marcus was the only prisoner and I took over supervising his last few trips to the Super Loo. During the day he had declined to give a formal statement, but during our second walk down the hall he struck up a conversation.

“Crazy couple of nights, eh?” he started. It was like he wanted me to know he was different than the other two. I knew he was, I still really wanted to know how he ended up a swallower. So I asked.

Marcus lost his job the same week that his girlfriend told him he was going to be a father. He had always worked and took pride in being able to afford what he wanted: a car, a shared apartment, and money for evenings out with his friends.

Marcus’ father always worked hard and Marcus looked up to him for that. So when he hit the rough patch, he went to visit his father in Jamaica.

“I asked him,” Marcus said, “How did he always manage to keep it together with one job and three kids?” Marcus got quiet, like he was holding back anger. “Then, then that’s when he told me about this.”

Marcus’ father would work as much as he could, but when the ends weren’t meeting, he’d go visit his mother in Jamaica and come back with a belly full of cocaine. After a week of his father explaining that swallowing was how his family was able to make ends meet, Marcus decided to do it.

It seemed obvious, but I had to tell him that I thought it was a tremendous risk, not only the risk of getting caught, but the very real risk of dying if a pellet bursts.

“It’s one of those things that seemed like a good idea at the time,” Marcus said. “But no offence, I don’t ever want to come back here again.” A couple of hours later, Marcus was off into the court system with all of his pellets safely passed.

I never saw Martin and Shawn again. I heard that they pled guilty at the very first opportunity. In fact they tried to plead guilty to the justice of the peace at their bail hearing. They were sentenced and they spent their time in a Canadian prison. They were both granted early release and were deported directly from prison. As far as I know, they are both free men now but they can’t ever come back to Canada or the United States. They had it good here and they took a terrible risk and lost. At least they never blamed anyone other than themselves for their lot.

I saw Marcus once more. He too pled guilty and offered no excuse other than an apology to the court. He was sentenced and I met him at our office two years later when he came to collect some of his belongings. He had gotten a job at an auto parts plant in the area after he was released. He told me that he was making good money and had benefits for his daughter.

The Super Loo brings people to rock bottom very quickly, but Marcus shows that you don’t have to live there. He shook my hand, looked me in the eye, and told me to take care of myself before he walked confidently out of the detachment.