Nero found guilty on cocaine trafficking charges

Cocaine kingpin Nick Nero has been found guilty in the largest cocaine bust in Niagara’s history. Nero and Martino Caputo were found guilty in a Toronto court today — of conspiracy to traffic and import cocaine for the benefit of a criminal organization.

Prosecutors say that criminal organization imported a ton of cocaine a month into Canada.

Nick Nero was arrested and charged in St. Catharines just months after 110 kilos or 30 million dollars worth of cocaine were uncovered in a Davidson Avenue warehouse in St. Catharines in February 2012.

Nero had been living in a downtown halfway house at the time. He was on parole for an earlier armoured car heist. The waterfront townhouse Nero shared in Niagara-on-the-Lake with his girlfriend Tawnya Delben Fletcher was raided.

He was sent back to prison. At the time of his arrest, police allege that while Nero was behind bars, he was still calling the shots in a massive international drug ring. A ring capable of importing and distributing near two billion dollars worth of cocaine every year.

Nero and Fletcher faced additional charges. Also charged with cocaine trafficking is Alfonso Inclima. Martino Caputo, the man prosecutors say was Nero’s right hand man was still at large in Germany. He was later extradited back to Canada.

This week in a Toronto courtroom, Nero and Caputo were found guilty of conspiracy to traffic and import cocaine for the benefit of a criminal organization.

Inclima and Fletcher pled guilty to conspiracy to traffic in cocaine.

Nero, Caputo and Inclima will be back in a Toronto court next month. The girlfriend Tawnya Fletcher will be sentenced on Thursday. Caputo and Nero were charged with first degree murder in the killing of Johnny Raposo in Toronto’s Little Italy a couple of years ago.