French pilots jailed in 'Air Cocaine' smuggling case freed on appeal
Two French pilots convicted for their role in a spectacular 2013 drugs bust on a private jet in the Dominican Republic have been acquitted on appeal by a French court.
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The two men were originally sentenced to six years in prison in what became known as the "Air Cocaine" case, an attempt to smuggle 680 kilograms of the drug out of the Caribbean country.
Pascal Fauret and Bruno Odos had always denied any knowledge that the cocaine was on board the flight.
A key figure in the affair, who did not appeal his own conviction, said the two pilots had been "conned".
The court freed the two airmen, but upheld the sentences of the directors of the aviation company, and of Ali Bouchareb, the man accused of being behind the drug trafficking scheme.
In March 2013, Dominican police found the narcotics packed into 26 suitcases on board a Falcon 50 jet as it prepared to fly from the Dominican beach resort of Punta Cana to Saint-Tropez in the south of France.
While out on bail, the two pilots managed to flee the Dominican Republic to French territory in the Caribbean in mysterious circumstances, but were re-arrested upon their return to the French mainland in November 2015.
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