A Dutch national has been jailed for ten years after being found guilty of importing more than $200,000 of cocaine into Bermuda.

Eddy Frankyln Filiciana, 44, showed no emotion as the foreman of the 11-woman one-man jury announced guilty verdicts on two counts of importation and possession with intent to supply by a split of ten to two.

Filiciana was arrested as he tried to enter Bermuda from the Netherlands in December 2001. He was subsequently charged with importation and possession with intent to supply 814.6 grams of cocaine found inside his stomach.

Filiciana, however, always maintained his innocence throughout the four-day-long trial, claiming that he believed the 90 pellets he swallowed in the Netherlands before coming to Bermuda contained money, not cocaine.

Summing up the case before sending the jury out to consider their verdict yesterday, Assistant Justice Archibald Warner pointed out that the evidence in the case was not in dispute, it was simply an issue of whether Filiciana knew what he was carrying was cocaine.

“You cannot see his mind,” said Mr. Warner, adding the jurors would have to infer what had really happened. “What you simply do is draw a common sense conclusion.”

The jury returned from their deliberations in just over an hour and a half.

Sentencing was held immediately after the verdict was read. Crown counsel Charmaine Smith, citing two precedents, asked Mr. Warner for an immediate custodial sentence of 10 to 14 years.

Defence counsel Patrick Doherty, however, cited several other cases where defendants received lesser sentences. He also asked Mr. Warner to take into account Filiciana's state of mind and health.

Standing, but leaning his chin and arms on the dock, a quiet Filiciana told the court that he had nothing to say in mitigation of his sentencing.

“This is a serious offence,” said Mr. Warner. “Dangerous drugs continue to wreak havoc in this society.”

He sentenced Filiciana to ten years incarceration at Westgate, with time already served to be taken into consideration.

The maximum sentence for Filiciana's crimes is a fine of any amount, life imprisonment, or both.