Moroccan Drug Baron’s Appeal Challenges Conviction in Massive Encro Case

The lawyers of the drug trafficker, Maxime Parewyck and Gilles Vanderbeck, have challenged eleven essential points on which the criminal court had relied to consider their client as one of the leaders of a drug trafficking network in the vast Encro case. According to the defense, the named Eridan M. G. would be the operational arm of the gang leader and Abdelwahab G. would be under his orders. Mr. Parewyck explains that the expressions "Hello, boss" and "Hello, boss" launched by the latter to his alleged leader in telephone conversations intercepted by the investigators, were taken out of context.

The lawyers also denied their client’s involvement in the importation of 387 kilograms of cocaine through the port of Antwerp and in the seizure of 9.2 tons of drugs in Morocco. For Parewyck, the fact that Abdelwahab G. stated in a recording that "friends" lost this cargo is proof that he is not involved in this traffic. The defense lawyer also challenged the reliability of the transcripts of the wiretapped conversations. For these reasons, Maxime Parewyck and Gilles Vanderbeck are asking the court to re-examine the case and reclassify the facts as an attempted drug importation.