Shaheed "Roger" Khan is a Guyanese criminal who was active in drugs trafficking, money laundering and arms smuggling. He trafficked cocaine from Colombia into the United States and used construction and forestry businesses to launder money. Khan was considered to be Guyana's most powerful drug lord. In US embassy cables published by WikiLeaks Khan's control over Guyana is compared with Pablo Escobar's erstwhile control over Colombia. Khan is allegedly the head of the notorious and lethal "Phantom Squad" which Caribbean Guyana Institute for Democracy has described as a murderous killing machine and which the US Federal Courts have said has already killed over 200 people during the 2002–2006 crimewave in Guyana. There have been repeated claims that Khan had close ties with the Guyanese government. In 2006, after police issued an arrest warrant for him, Khan had publicly said in an advertisement that he was fighting criminals on behalf of the government. Khan used to surround himself with a coterie of former police tactical squad members for security. According to cables published by Wikileaks Khan used to pay his low-level security personnel USD 1,600 per month—at least eight times what they previously earned with the police force. In 1993 Khan was arrested in Burlington, Vermont for receiving and possessing firearms while being a convicted felonwife for possession of illegal firearms and ammunition, along with a large quantity of cocaine found at the residence. It was later established that his wife, Nafeeza Khan was released after questioning in Miami Florida and returned to Guyana. In June, 2016 Nafeeza was said to be administering both Khans' assets and terminated the "phantom death squad", or what was left of it. However, it was never verified that she was involved in any drug related instances said, New York Cables Edition. Khan's lawyer in his case was Robert Simels. Simels is former lawyer of convicted drug traffickerKenneth McGriff and AmericanmobsterHenry Hill, who received international fame because of the 1990 American crime movieGoodfellas which portrays his rise and fall. On 4 December 2009, Khan's lawyer was sentenced to 14 years in prison for, after consulting with Khan in jail, instructing a hit-man to kill the star witness in Khan's case. However, the hit-man turned out to be a government informant who secretly recorded the conversations with Simels. Simels and Khan were also convicted of possessing illegal eavesdropping equipment, which was seized in a raid on Simels' East Side offices.
