A car bumper that was delivered from a Caribbean island to Bermuda was found to contain two hidden packages when it was scanned by an X-ray machine at Bermuda International Airport, a court was told.

Police immediately took charge of the item and it was sent to the Bermuda Police Service headquarters to be examined, where the hidden packages were extracted and found to be plastic accordion-style tubes with screw tops.

Two men are standing trial at the Supreme Court accused of importing cocaine to Bermuda in auto parts in 2004. Jahmiko Hayward and Shannon Dwayne Julian Tucker both deny the charge.

Giving evidence in court, Det. Con. Trevor Knight of the narcotics department, said he had been on duty at the airport baggage hall in early 2004 when a silver-coloured car bumper covered in bubble wrap packaging and tape had been brought into the secondary search area and placed on an X-ray machine to be examined.

“On the monitor I could see two objects at each end of the tubing of the bumper,” explained the officer.

“The bumper was taken to the Police garage in Prospect. The garage mechanic removed two caps attached to the bumper. He used a saw to cut the welding off the caps. I looked in and could see two cylindrical objects down in the tubing of the bumper guard. I removed the objects from inside the bumper guard.”

The objects turned out to be two plastic, accordion tubes sealed at one end with a screw cap on the other.

Earlier in the trial the jury heard that a DHL express courier service office on the island of St. Martin had accepted two packages containing auto parts to be delivered to Bermuda.

Tucker was the registered “shipper” of the packages and also gave his name as the recipient of the goods in Bermuda.

The court was told that on April 5, 2004 narcotics officer waited in an unmarked car outside the DHL courier service office in Church Street where they expected a package containing controlled drugs would be collected. The court has heard that the officers then followed a taxi and made an arrest.

Det. Con. Walter Jackson was called to the junction of Cedar Avenue and Victoria Street to assist with the arrest of a taxi passenger.

He told the court: “I saw Police officers had stopped a taxi and inside were passengers. One was Hayward. That passenger was removed from the taxi and arrested on suspicion of importation of controlled drugs.”

Det. Con. Jackson said Hayward was taken to Hamilton Police Station to be processed and then taken to a property in North Shore Road, Hamilton Parish, where detectives conducted a search inside the premises.

Hayward, of Green Acres, Devonshire is represented by lawyer Allan Doughty. Tucker, of Broken Hill Lane, Smith’s, is representing himself in the trial. The case continues.