The husband of the Shadow Minister of Works and Engineering will make his first court appearance on August 15 to answer to drug charges.

Dennis Pamplin, the husband of Pat Gordon-Pamplin, the former Deputy Leader of the UBP, was arrested a week ago with another man, Brian Henry, following the seizure of 700 pounds of marijuana.

A police dog sniffed the marijuana hidden inside six concrete pillars at a warehouse in Orange, New Jersey.

The two men were caught in what was a yearlong investigation between the New Jersey DEA and the Bermuda Police Service. Since July of last year, according to a Bermuda Police spokesperson, Andrew Boyce, Chief Inspector, Henry assisted Pamplin in the packaging of more than 1,000 kilos of marijuana for five shipments to the Island from Port of Newark in New Jersey.

Also seized from the warehouse last week were scales, hydraulic pressing machines, vacuum-sealing materials, and disc shaped steel moulds.

Both Pamplin and Henry were charged in the Southern District of New York with conspiracy to unlawfully, intentionally and knowingly distribute and possess with the intent to distribute 1,000 kilos and more of a mixture and substance containing a detectable amount of marijuana.

Henry was remanded into custody of the US Marshals Service with no bail and Pamplin was remanded into custody of the US Marshals Service in lieu of a $3 million personal recognisance bond. At 10 a.m. on August 15, both men will appear in the Southern District of New York court house for the preliminary hearing.