Two female hospital workers detailed their roles in an impromptu sting operation which led Police to an accused drug dealer for a Supreme Court jury yesterday.

Witness Cindy Pace said that she was traumatised and afraid for her life as she wore a Police wire while talking to the defendant moments before his arrest at the hospital in July of last year.

Andrew James Smith, 37, denies charges of importation and possession of $360,000 worth of cannabis with intent to supply.

Smith, a former King Edward VII Memorial Hospital employee, is accused of having the drugs shipped to the hospital concealed among office supplies from overseas.

The six-man, six-woman jury heard yesterday that two women in the materials management department of the hospital worked with Police when the shipment of drugs arrived in Bermuda.

Mrs. Pace told the court that another hospital employee alerted her to the presence of suspicious packages in the crate addressed to the hospital's library.

Mrs. Pace said that she and other hospital workers smelled the package and then alerted security and called the Police.

Later that evening, however, Mrs. Pace said the defendant came by her home and told her she could name her price if she got the package to him.

Smith allegedly made the comment in the presence of Mrs. Pace's friend and co-worker Lewanda Morrison.

Mrs. Pace told Smith to give her some time, the court heard. She contacted Police and later arranged to meet Smith at the hospital - with Police hiding in wait.

Ms Morrison accompanied Mrs. Pace to Police headquarters and later the hospital to complete the sting.

Both Mrs. Pace and Ms Morrison testified that when Pace arrived at the hospital for the package that evening, Ms Morrison let him in the fire door.

Mrs. Pace was wearing a recording device and when she turned it one, it made a noise which startled Smith, she said.

“I thought I was dead,” she said. “It was a terrifying experience.”

But she suggested to the accused the sound came from the fax machine as he went and searched one of the other rooms.

Finding no one, the defendant then approached a bunch of boxes, found the drugs crate and began trying to open it with a knife, the court heard.

When he opened the crate, Smith used a towel to search around the various items before he found the package, Mrs. Pace said.

She said Ms Morrison left the room before he began searching the crate and, when she had assumed he found the drugs and Narcotics officers burst in, she too turned and ran from the room.

The two women huddled behind a locked door until Police eventually knocked.

“I was afraid but, I answered it and it was a Narcotics officer,” Mrs. Pace said.

Ms Morrison's testimony of events closely matched that of her colleague.

However, on cross examination defence lawyer Richard Hector questioned both women about a mysterious visit to Mrs. Pace's office that afternoon by the brother of an old boyfriend.

Mrs. Pace said she had not seen the man since he was a small boy but he came to her office and asked if she knew ‘Drew' - and she assumed he meant the defendant Andrew Smith.

Mrs. Pace said she then told the man not to say another word and motioned for him to leave the office.

Mr. Hector suggested that Mrs. Pace's behaviour had been strange with the mystery man.

“It was not strange because of what happened earlier,” she said. “It just seemed to click.”

Meanwhile, Ms Morrison said she had never seen the man before in her life.

Mr. Hector had both women recite descriptions of the mystery man and suggested he has since disappeared from the Island.

Mr. Hector also caught out discrepancies between the Police statements the women gave in July and their testimony in court this week.