Three suspects have pleaded guilty in a drug smuggling case after a boat loaded with around $28 million worth of cocaine was stopped in the waters off Miami Beach last year, authorities said.
Erasme Catalino Paulino Rodriguez, 35; Joseito Diaz De Oleo, 48; and Ober Alexander Villavicencio Jimenez, 36, all from the Dominican Republic, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to import a controlled substance, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida said Wednesday.
The trio were aboard the M/V Best Bet, a 65-foot sport-fishing vessel, when they were stopped by the U.S. Coast Guard about six miles off the coast of Government Cut on Dec. 2, 2025.
U.S. Coast GuardU.S. Coast Guard
Three people were taken into custody after a suspected drug smuggling boat loaded with some \$28 million worth of cocaine was stopped in the waters off Miami Beach, authorities said.
Coast Guard officials said once the vessel was brought pierside, more than 1,000 concealed packages of cocaine were found onboard.
The cocaine weighed around, 1,694 kilograms, or 3,715 pounds, with a value of around $28 million, officials said.
It was the largest USCG Small boat station cocaine seizure since 1995, officials said.
Largest ❄️ seizure by a @USCG boat station since 1995!🚨
A Sta Miami Beach & @CBP #LE crew seized over 3,716lbs of cocaine worth an est. $28M, from a suspected drug smuggling boat, near Gov Cut, Tues. @HSI_Miami #WeOwnTheSea
🔗: https://t.co/CgOivNj4G5 pic.twitter.com/onrwFhI43G
— U.S. Coast Guard Southeast (@USCGSoutheast) December 5, 2025
Prosecutors said Rodriguez, De Oleo, and Jimenez admitted they piloted the Best Bet east from Miami to a pre-determined location near the Turks and Caicos, where they met a smaller vessel carrying four Dominican men who transferred duffle bags filled with cocaine.
The trio concealed the drugs on board and began the return trip to Miami, where they were intercepted, officials said.
All three face a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years in prison and up to life in prison.
“This was a large-scale maritime cocaine smuggling operation aimed at bringing nearly 1.7 metric tons of poison into South Florida,” U.S. Attorney Jason A. Reding Quiñones for the Southern District of Florida said in a statement. “That amount of cocaine fuels addiction, violence, and cartel profits on a massive scale. These guilty pleas disrupted a major trafficking pipeline and reflect the strength of coordinated federal enforcement at sea and on land. If you move narcotics toward our shores, you will be intercepted, prosecuted, and sent to federal prison.”