NationalPost – Raekelle Powell, a professional volleyball player who competed internationally on Canada’s women’s team, was sentenced last week for smuggling 19 kilograms of cannabis into England.
U.K. border agents found Raekelle Powell, 22, carrying a suitcase jam-packed with 19 kilograms of cannabis after landing at Heathrow airport on a flight from Toronto on Sept. 20, Britain’s National Crime Agency said.
British authorities said Powell is from Toronto. She went to high school in Brampton.
She is an outside hitter in volleyball and was on Canada’s under-19 indoor volleyball team that took a silver medal at the NORCECA Championship in 2018, upsetting a favoured Cuba and finishing second to the United States. NORCECA stands for the North, Central America and Caribbean Volleyball Confederation.
Powell was arrested during a swarm of cannabis crossing attempts in London.
Eleven people were charged for attempting to smuggle 300 kilos of cannabis within two days at Heathrow and Gatwick, London’s two busiest airports.
When she was asked about it, she said she was paid $300 to carry the suitcase. The drugs had an estimated street value in Britain of more than a million dollars.
Powell quickly pleaded guilty in court and last week she was sentenced to 15 months in jail at Isleworth Crown Court in London.
Three others were arrested on the Saturday that Powell arrived, seven others the next day.
Two other Canadians are among those arrested. Charges against Christopher Duffell, 44, and Tania Fetherston, 51, who police allege arrived on a flight from Toronto via Copenhagen carrying 30.7 kilos and 34.7 kilos of cannabis in their luggage, are still before the courts.
