Pubdate: Sat, 07 Jul 2001
Source: Commercial Appeal (TN)
Copyright: 2001 The Commercial Appeal
Contact:  http://www.gomemphis.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/95
Author: Bill Dries

DUTCH WOMAN PLEADS GUILTY TO ECSTASY CHARGE

An Amsterdam woman, who was searched and arrested in March seconds after 
she stepped off a KLM flight from Amsterdam to Memphis, pleaded guilty 
Friday to trying to bring nearly 7 1/2 pounds - or 10,500 doses - of the 
club drug Ecstasy into Memphis.

Dorothy Ingrid Leijen pleaded guilty to one count of drug possession with 
intent to distribute.

Leijen is one of three defendants in Ecstasy cases who are either from 
Amsterdam or who have a connection to the Dutch city.

She is scheduled to be sentenced in September by U.S. Dist. Judge Julia 
Gibbons.

Leijen was arrested in March at Memphis International Airport after a 
Customs agent noticed something suspicious and called for a search of Leijen.

Asst. U.S. Atty. Stuart Canale told Gibbons that Customs agents found 
several packages of Ecstasy tablets strapped to her body.

A grand jury indicted Leijen four days later.

Prosecutors say Amsterdam is a major source of Ecstasy for the Memphis area.

Kenneth Julius Caupain, 20, of Amsterdam, was sentenced in April to 18 
months in prison and deportation at the end of the prison sentence after he 
pleaded guilty to bringing 6,000 doses of Ecstasy to Memphis from Amsterdam.

Andrian Anh-Tuan Dest, 26, a U.S. citizen who lived in Amsterdam at one 
time, pleaded guilty to federal Ecstasy charges in May.

Dest was jailed days before his guilty plea on a new Ecstasy charge.

During a search of his Cordova home, investigators found a new passport to 
replace the one he had to turn over in order to be released on his own 
recognizance. 
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom