Police seized tonnes of Illegally harvested beche-de-mers
By AATAI JOHN
POLICE on Thursday seized tonnes of illegally-harvested beche-de-mers when they raided three separate business residences in Honiara.
The raids stunned and shock on-lookers.
The raids were carried out at St. Nicholas, Ranadi, and Ngossi.
These were the same locations used to prepare the beche-de-mers for export.
The Solomon Star witnessed the raids at St Nicholas and Ranadi.
Police descended on the St. Nicholas property at around 12 midday, which was owned by Chinese businessman Frank Sheng Song.
Song was told in no uncertain terms to surrender all the beche-de-mers, which police will allege were harvested during the period of the ban.
Police entered the building and removed the bags of beche-de-mers while other officers moved around the apartment to load products that were brought out to be sun-dried on the concrete pavement.
A search warrant was issued by police officers to Song when he attempted to argue and stop the raid.
Song was told by police that the confiscated beche-dee-mer will be kept under the custody of police, while the courts deal with the case.
Police revealed to the Solomon Star that they have to take four to five trips to transport the beche-de-mers to the Honiara Central Police Station.
At the Ranadi business property, Member of Parliament for Malaita Outer Islands (MOI) Martin Kealoe suddenly showed up when officers were removing the bags of beche-de-mer from the store house.
The Solomon Star was at the scene when the MP arrived in his red G-Plate vehicle, and approached the officer in charge of the operation.
The property is located next to Auto Mate Tyre Repair, Opposite Discount Auto Parts.
When Mr Kealoe confronted the officers, he was shown a search warrant and was told police are acting on orders to remove the beche-de-mers.
The Solomon Star went inside the building and witnessed the white bags filled with beche-de-mers being piled up to the roof.
An officer said there were more beche-de-mers seized from the Ranadi property than at St. Nicholas.
Up at Ngossi, officers were dispatched to watch over the stored beche-de-mers there, while waiting for a truck to transport the products to the police station.
