A Bermuda Customs officer who was involved in the front line fight against drugs is set to return home in the next few days -- and faces the certain loss of her career.

Betty Azzario, who was sentenced on Tuesday in New York for her part in attempting to smuggle cocaine into Bermuda, looks destined to be dismissed from the Customs Department.

Mrs. Azzario, a mother of four, had been in the service for 12 years and was a drugs-dog handler before she was caught at JFK airport last December, trying to carry 3.5 pounds of cocaine on to a Bermuda-bound plane.

The drugs were worth around $50,000 in the US and considerably more in Bermuda, where they were headed.

She was suspended on half-pay whilst on remand in the US and is expected to lose her job, after the proper disciplinary procedures are followed.

Collector of Customs Bill LeDrew said he could not comment on the outcome of the process but said civil servants involved in law enforcement are in a position of trust.

"As a general rule, public servants, particularly those involved in law enforcement, being convicted of an offence as serious as that, particularly when your job is to stop drugs, makes it pretty difficult to see how a person could continue to work in that environment,'' he said.

In a Brooklyn court on Tuesday, a district judge ordered Azzario's sentence to be the time she has already served whilst on remand, due to her cooperation which led to co-accused Dennis Robinson being caught in a sting operation.

According to US law enforcement sources, she could be heading back to the Island as soon as today.

Prosecutor Jack Smith said her release would be imminent, as soon as immigration formalities were sorted out.

He added that she was handed a lesser sentence than Robinson, who got three years, because of her cooperation with the authorities. She set up Robinson, who was arrested at a New York hotel.

In addition, he said the court heard that she was recruited by Robinson and would not have been involved if it had not been for him.

Mr. Smith said the sentences were lower than what could have been handed out in a state court. Azzario used a fake Bermuda Customs letter and claimed the drugs were phoney, as part of an exercise.

Mr. LeDrew said his department would be making a request to the Public Services Commission, who would then refer the matter, with a recommendation to the Governor, who would then make the final decision.

"We do have checks and balances in the system. I think we have a high level of integrity in this department but again there always seems to be one or another who falls to the temptation,'' he said.

"We do things right here, officers are carefully recruited and trained well.

Our system is good and we do have good individual checks.'' Azzario pleaded guilty to importing cocaine and conspiracy charges. Robinson pleaded guilty to conspiracy to distribute narcotics.