Ex-Police Office Worker Sentenced to Over 11 Years in Firearms Smuggling Case
A 33-year-old former administrative worker with the Cayman Islands police force received a sentence exceeding a decade for his part in a scheme to bring weapon parts and bullets into the territory.
Ex-Police Office Worker Sentenced to Over 11 Years in Firearms Smuggling Case
A 33-year-old former administrative worker with the Cayman Islands police force received a sentence exceeding a decade for his part in a scheme to bring weapon parts and bullets into the territory.
Courtney Bush Myles Jr admitted guilt last October to multiple charges, including plotting to bring in firearms and their components, keeping an unlicensed weapon, holding ammunition, and abusing his public position. Justice Cheryll Richards handed down the punishment on 18 June.
The territory's police force announced the next day that the operation had brought in components sufficient to construct at least 14 weapons. The shipment included pieces for seven semi-automatic handguns and seven semi-automatic rifles of an assault variety, alongside over 3,000 rounds of bullets.
Richards assigned distinct penalties for each violation: four years and eight months for the weapons-import plot, two years and four months for the ammunition conspiracy, seven years for the illegal weapon possession, two years for the bullets possession, and two years and seven months for the public office abuse. The terms for the weapons-import scheme and the illegal possession charge run back-to-back, creating the total of 11 years and eight months. Other penalties overlap simultaneously, with deduction for days already spent behind bars.
The probe kicked off in mid-2022 when detectives investigating a shooting came across proof of a smuggling network manipulating delivery services to slip weapon components past border checks. Detectives identified an ex-employee of a shipping firm who was leveraging internal know-how to organise incoming parcels. That person was apprehended, and raids followed at properties connected to him and his contacts.
At the home of Eddie Marlon Ebanks, officers discovered a weapon. Another gun and bullets were later taken from Myles' dwelling. Examinations showed these weapons had been put together using the smuggled components.
Myles lost his civilian post with the Royal Cayman Islands Police Service after being taken into custody. He had first rejected the accusations at hearings in March 2023 and April 2025, when prosecutors also charged Chanel Andrea Cranston and Tiquan Raheem Forbes over the same network, which additionally involved body armour and narcotics. Jurors cleared Forbes of unlawfully keeping a Springfield Armory XD-40 handgun in October 2025.
Ebanks had earlier confessed to keeping an unlicensed weapon and on 25 October 2023 received the mandatory minimum of seven years. He also pleaded guilty to the conspiracy counts on 18 September 2025, and this week received another year and a half to follow his existing term. Cranston, the remaining accused, was spared imprisonment.
Commissioner of Police Kurt Walton hailed the result, declaring that those who profit from feeding the territory's appetite for illegal arms are "merchants of evil" who bear equal blame for street bloodshed. He credited the sustained effort by police detectives and the Anti-Corruption Commission.
Source: Cayman News Service
Source: Google News KY — Crime