One of the two foreign nationals using diving gear in an attempt to retrieve a large shipment of cocaine from a ship docked at the Koper port in March has been sentenced to eight years in prison after pleading guilty, while the second one failed to reach a plea bargain with the prosecution and will face trial.

The men, Albanian Edi Bajrami and Brazilian Romul De Souza Silva, were first spotted diving near the Federal Tokoro ship that sailed in Luka Koper from Brazil in mid-March.

The next day, the crew heard banging on the hull and later spotted two divers swimming away from the ship. Security and the police were called, with the latter tracing the pair upstream the Rižana River, still within the boundaries of the Koper port.

Only days later, 258 kilos of cocaine was found on the Federal Tokoro, which the men were allegedly hired to retrieve. The drugs were packed in seven parcels, each containing 30 bags.

Bajrami and De Souza Silva were charged with being part of an international criminal ring with the intention of transporting illicit drugs. The gross price of the seized drug shipment is estimated at €9 million.

The pair were allegedly tasked with diving under the ship and unscrewing the suction basket of a sea water pump with a monkey wrench, enter the ship and retrieve the cocaine.

At the pre-trial hearing in July, both pleaded not guilty, but Bajrami, 41, has since changed his mind. He was sentenced to eight years in prison by the the Koper District Court on 22 October. Due to a dire financial situation, he was not ordered to pay court costs.

De Souza Silva has not reached a plea agreement with the prosecution, even though the hearing was suspended for negotiations twice during the arraignment. The defendant initially said he would not be defending himself, but later provided detailed answers.

The 36-year-old Brazilian said he had to do the job in Koper to get out of debt. He has been a drug user since he was at least 15 and owed €4,000 to drug dealers. That is a lot of money in Brazil, he said, adding that he could have been killed over the debt and that his family had received threats as well.

Struggling with mental illness after breaking out of a rehabilitation clinic at the start of the year, he was given a plane ticket by drug dealers, and ordered to leave for Milan, Italy the next day. From there he was taken by van to Koper, he said, adding that he did not know where he had been taken.

In Koper, he stayed in a rented apartment with Bajrami and other persons, the driver and a woman, who was also in the van, as well an Albanian and a man who was in charge. The latter was also the only person De Souza Silva talked to, as he was the only one to speak Portuguese.

De Souza Silva said that he and Bajrami communicated with gestures.

The Brazilian said that on their first dive to the ship, on 13 March, they failed to find the entry point and had returned to land. The man in charge then phoned to Brazil and the boss there demanded that they return and retrieve the drugs at any cost.

The next day they managed to unscrew one screw before being discovered, said De Souza Silva, who is facing between 5 and 15 years in prison. He will face trial in December.