Wired868 Wired868 for smart sport news and opinion
Sport administrator, businessman and football coach Shem Alexander has pleaded guilty to “conspiracy to smuggle firearms from the United States to Trinidad and Tobago”, according to a release from the United States Attorney’s Office.
The outcome of the case was verified by Alexander’s family in Trinidad and Tobago, although both parties still disagree on the 35-year-old Trinidadian’s role in a massive firearm seizure at the Piarco International Airport.
Photo: 12 Media Productions.
US authorities initially described Alexander as “leader of a transnational criminal organisation”, which illegally exported firearms and firearms components to the two-island republic. He faced a maximum of 20 years if convicted.
Alexander, who managed Trinidad and Tobago’s national youth football league between 2022 and 2024 and also coached MIC Matura United and the Hillview College under-14 team, was still referred to as a gang leader in the heading of yesterday’s release.
However, that description was not used in the actual release—and the plea arrangement saw his potential penalty reduced to a maximum of five years in federal prison.
“Prosecutors painted him as the mastermind of a major international gun trafficking conspiracy—but the truth is far different,” stated a release from the Justice and Freedom for Shem Campaign, which is led by his sister Collete Alexander.
“This week, Alexander entered into a 0-to-5-year plea agreement, meaning he could walk free at sentencing. More importantly, the statutes he pled to expose how weak the case really was, and how systemic failures across multiple governments put him in this position in the first place.”
Alexander was, in fact, the fifth person to plead guilty for their involvement in the shipping of firearms and firearms components to Trinidad in April 2021.
The items were concealed in two punching bags and seized by members of the Trinidad and Tobago Police Service and Customs and Excise Division at the Piarco International Airport on 21 April 2021.
The punching bags contained approximately: 11 9mm pistols, 2 .38 caliber special revolvers, a 12 gauge semi-automatic shotgun, 3 AR-15 barrel foregrips, 19 lower pistol grip assemblies, 11 forearm bolt assemblies, 3 AR-15-style barrels with forearm grips, 32 AR-15 magazines, 1 AR-15 drum magazine, 470 rounds of AR-15 ammunition, 34 9mm magazines, 3 9mm drum magazines, 284 9mm rounds, 15 .38 caliber rounds, 36 shells, 6 magazine couplers, and 2 shotgun chokes.
Two years later, Trinidad and Tobago nationals Tevin O’Brian Oliver and Jameal Kaia Phillip pleaded guilty to conspiracy to smuggle goods from the United States, while American Edward Solomon King III pleaded guilty to “disposing of a firearm to an alien who had been admitted to the United States under a nonimmigrant visa.”
Oliver and Phillip each received sentences of four years and nine months in prison, in addition to three years of supervised release.
On 23 June 2025, Florida high school teacher Shannon Lee Samlalsingh, 46, pleaded guilty to making false statements to a firearms dealer in making “straw purchases” of weapons, which the US authorities said were smuggled to Trinidad for a “transnational criminal organisation.”
She also faced five years in a federal prison.
Alexander’s plea agreement is a major development in the case, which was investigated by Homeland Security Investigations, including HSI’s Legal Attaché for the Caribbean, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, with assistance provided by the TTPS’ Transnational Organized Crime Unit and Special Investigations Unit, United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, and United States Customs and Border Protection.
However, Alexander’s relatives retorted that the plea arrangement for conspiracy, smuggling and trafficking in firearms was “paperwork charges” that he accepted due to the supposedly low burden of proof for the US government in conspiracy cases.
“From the start, Shem was caught in a system designed to disadvantage him—one that began not in a US courtroom, but with political shortcuts and governmental neglect,” stated the Justice and Freedom for Shem Campaign.
“[…] In plain terms: Shem did not plead guilty to running guns or leading a criminal ring. He pled guilty to a basic export paperwork conspiracy, a far cry from the ‘ringleader’ story once pushed by US prosecutors.
“[…] What makes this clearer is that Shem never spoke to US agents or prosecutors. He gave them no statement, no confession, no narrative to twist against him.
“Yet, even without his cooperation, they still downgraded their sweeping accusations to a technical 0-to-5-year paperwork charge. That retreat speaks volumes. It shows prosecutors never had the evidence they once claimed.”
The US Department of Justice appeared to have no physical or financial evidence that linked Alexander to the shipment of firearms, beyond his link to King, Phillip and Oliver.
According to US Code 371 on Conspiracy to commit an offence or to defraud the United States:
“If two or more persons conspire either to commit any offense against the United States, or to defraud the United States, or any agency thereof in any manner or for any purpose, and one or more of such persons do any act to effect the object of the conspiracy, each shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both.”
The Alexanders described it as a “catch-all law” which “stacked the deck” against the young administrator.
“Many ask: if the case was so weak, why take a plea at all?” Alexander (C) noted. “The answer lies in how federal juries are instructed. In conspiracy cases, jurors are told:
• They don’t need proof that the crime was completed, just proof of an agreement.
• The defendant doesn’t need to be the leader or even active; mere association is enough.
• An “overt act” to further the conspiracy doesn’t need to be a crime; a phone call, a trip, or a text will do.
• Jurors can infer knowledge from behaviour or silence, even without hard evidence.”
They claimed that the US judicial system is built more “to pressure defendants into silence and submission” than to uncover the truth.
Alexander (C) also pointed US Code 371 on conspiracy which states that: “the government does not have to prove that the members planned together all the details of the plan or the ‘overt acts’ that the indictment charges would be carried out in an effort to commit the intended crime.”
“This is why 97 per cent of federal cases end in plea deals: the instructions make it nearly impossible to win at trial,” claimed the Justice and Freedom for Shem Campaign. “But on appeal, where judges apply stricter scrutiny, defendants succeed in nearly 65 per cent of cases. The gap itself is proof of how unfairly weighted the trial stage is.
“For Shem, that imbalance meant risking decades in prison if he fought, even though the government’s evidence was threadbare. The 0 to 5 year plea was a survival move in a system designed to coerce pleas, not test proof.”
In 2021, Alexander’s home was raided by the TTPS at the instruction of US authorities as part of a 15-month investigation. However, with no evidence linking the Gateway Athletics managing director to a crime, the Office of the DPP dropped the case.
Rather than try to convince Trinidad and Tobago courts of the strength of their case, US authorities instead had Alexander arrested and extradited during a trip to Jamaica.
“Although charges were laid against Alexander in April 2024, the US government never sent a warrant to Trinidad and Tobago,” stated the Justice and Freedom for Shem Campaign. “[…] Trinidad and Tobago stood by as one of its own citizens was pulled into a foreign jurisdiction.
Photo: Office of the President.
“By failing to question the veracity of the arrest or intervene diplomatically, Trinidad and Tobago surrendered its right to defend its citizens within its own borders.
“[…] Alexander’s ordeal highlights the deep flaws in the US judicial system, but it also underscores how regional governments failed him. A flawed diplomatic note, a Jamaican government that didn’t demand evidence, and a Trinidadian government that stayed silent, all combined to place an innocent man in the crosshairs of a foreign system stacked against him.”
Alexander’s family hopes that, with sentencing set for 90 days, the judge considers time already served and “the weakness of the charges,” and allows the Trinidadian to return home.
He attended South East Port of Spain Government Secondary and El Dorado Senior Comprehensive (now El Dorado East Secondary).
Alexander, according to his relatives, intends to “tell the full story of his ordeal and work to make a difference in the lives of others who find themselves victims of an unjust US judicial system.”
“His case is not about guilt,” continued the statement, “but about how political expediency and systemic flaws combined to crush due process.”
For United States law enforcement officers, though, Alexander’s case was a success for the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF).
“The principal mission of the OCDETF program,” stated the US DOJ, “is to identify, disrupt, and dismantle the most serious transnational criminal organisations.”
|
Wired868 has provided readers with solid, independent journalism since 2012. If you appreciate our work, please contribute to our efforts. Support Independent Journalism |
“[…] Shem Alexander, who remains in pre-trial detention in Florida, was arrested in Jamaica and extradited in November 2024—despite being Read more
There were some late changes—and there may still be a few more tweaks—as the 2025 Republic Bank National Youth Football Read more
Gateway Athletics founder and prominent Trinidad and Tobago youth football coordinator Shem Alexander faces up to 20 years in federal Read more
Gateway Athletics issued a statement early this morning, in the first formal acknowledgment of the arrest of its managing director Read more
The Jamaica Constabulary Force confirmed today that Trinidad and Tobago national and burgeoning sport official Shem Alexander is in its Read more
Evolution Football Club’s remarkable rise from near the foot of the Central Zone standings to the title of Republic Bank Read more
Lasana Liburd is the managing director and chief editor at Wired868.com and a journalist with over 20 years experience at several Trinidad and Tobago and international publications including Play the Game, World Soccer, UK Guardian and the Trinidad Express.
