A Bakersfield man was the ''Robin Hood'' leader of a Kern County smuggling operation that sold millions of dollars of cocaine to gangs in Canada and used the money to help impoverished villagers in India, according to testimony at a federal trial.
''I'm the biggest there is,'' said the smuggler, who was convicted and faces a life prison term.
Harjeet Mann, 50, a Canadian citizen and resident of Bakersfield, was convicted by a federal jury in Fresno. A judge immediately ordered the forfeiture of more than a million dollars cash seized in the case.
Also convicted were Sukhraj Dahaliwal, 39, of Bakersfield, and Gurmeet Bisla, 29, of the Merced County community of Livingtson. Another man, Jasdev Singh, 34, of Bakersfield, pleaded guilty earlier to the conspiracy charge.
Mann, Dahaliwal and Singh were arrested June 26, 2008 after they brought $845,000 to a Bakersfield Denny's to buy 150 pounds of cocaine from a dealer. The dealer was really an undercover officer
During negotiations between with the undercover officer, Mann said he had shipped more than 39 tons of cocaine from Bakersfield to Canada in the previous five years, according to federal prosecutors.
''I'm the biggest there is,'' Mann told the officer, according to federal reports.
The case has received extensive coverage in the Asian and Canadian press, which reported that Mann and Singh, natives of the Punjabi village of Gureh, and Dhaliwal, from the neighboring village of Chimna, are considered modern day Robin Hoods.
Dhaliwal admitted at trial that he gives large sums of money to the villagers of Chimna, notwithstanding the lack of any employment history for him in the United States, where he has resided since the early 1990's, according to a news release from the U.S. Attorney's Office.
Mann, Dhaliwal and Bisla are scheduled to appear for sentencing before District Judge Oliver Wanger Sept. 14. Singh is scheduled for sentencing on Aug. 24.
All defendants face a mandatory minimum prison term of 10 years and a maximum of life, along with a maximum fine of $4 million, for the drug offenses.
Bisla stopped in Sheldon, Ill. while carrying $169,910 in drug money.
