American Tourist Facing 12 Years in Prison

Valerie Watson returned to Oklahoma City’s Will Rogers World Airport in tears in a drastic departure from how she imagined her long weekend trip to Turks and Caicos would end. The Turks and Caicos Islands is a British Overseas Territory, located in the Atlantic Ocean and considered a part of the Caribbean region.  Watson is home, but her husband, Ryan Watson, was jailed on the island and is facing a potential mandatory minimum sentence of 12 years behind bars after airport security allegedly found four rounds of hunting ammo in his carry-on bag.  “We were trying to pack board shorts and flip flops,” Valerie Watson told CBS News. “Packing ammunition was not at all our intent.”  Valerie Watson, who learned she would not be charged and would be allowed to return home, said the trip “went from what was supposed to be a dream vacation to a nightmare.”  Ryan Watson was released on bail after two nights, but must remain on the island and check in with police twice a week. 

The Watsons are not the only ones going through this ordeal.  Bryan Hagerich is awaiting trial after ammo was found in the Pennsylvania man’s checked bag in February.  “I subsequently spent eight nights in their local jail. Some of the darkest, hardest times of my life, quite frankly,” Hagerich said. “These last days have been kind of a roller coaster, just the pain and suffering of having your family at home and I’m here.”  Possessing a gun or ammunition is prohibited in Turks and Caicos, but tourists were previously often able to just pay a fine. In February, however, a court order mandated that even tourists in the process of leaving the country are subject to prison time.