A 28-year-old pilot already held on remand for a high-profile murder and a multi-million dollar international drug smuggling case has been handed additional prison time after authorities discovered marijuana in his jail cell. Donald Ferguson II, who is set to go on trial for the fatal shooting of Giovanni Rolle and involvement in a $15.3 million cocaine seizure, entered a guilty plea to a reduced charge of simple possession of marijuana on Thursday, receiving a six-month custodial sentence from Senior Magistrate Raquel Whyms.
The contraband, a one-ounce package of marijuana, was located during a search of Ferguson’s housing unit at the Bahamas Department of Correctional Services on June 9 of this year. Ferguson was already in pretrial detention at the facility facing two sets of extremely serious charges.
First, he is accused of gunning down 38-year-old Giovanni Rolle, a father of two, in Rolle’s vehicle on Coral Harbour Road, directly outside Rolle’s place of work at Jet Aviation, during the morning hours of June 16, 2024. Beyond the homicide allegation, Ferguson is also facing charges related to one of the largest recent drug seizures in Bahamian history. Prosecutors claim Ferguson and a group of co-conspirators plotted to smuggle 1,982 pounds of cocaine and 50 pounds of hydroponic marijuana into The Bahamas between the start of October and early December 2024.
The smuggling operation was disrupted after law enforcement recovered the entire drug shipment, packaged into 24 multi-colored bundles, from the wreckage of a blue-and-white plane that crashed near Acklins on December 6, 2024. The street value of the seized cocaine alone is estimated at $15.3 million, with the hydroponic marijuana adding an additional $50,000 to the total value of the bust.
Ferguson’s legal troubles extend beyond The Bahamas as well. He is one of 13 individuals who have been indicted in the United States in connection with an alleged transnational cocaine trafficking ring. Prosecutors on both sides of the border claim the network exploited weak security at Bahamian airports and even included high-ranking members of the Royal Bahamas Police Force and Royal Bahamas Defence Force in its operations.
Just last week, Ferguson’s legal team saw their latest bid for pretrial release rejected by Supreme Court Justice Dale Fitzpatrick, who ruled that releasing the defendant would carry unacceptable public safety and flight risk. In the current jail contraband case, prosecutors initially pursued a more severe charge of possession with intent to supply, but the count was downgraded to simple possession ahead of Ferguson’s plea. Alongside the six-month sentence for the marijuana possession, Magistrate Whyms added a three-month prison term for Ferguson violating the terms of probation from a prior offense. Both sentences will run concurrently with one another. Inspector 2257 Wilkinson served as the prosecuting officer for the case.