Cocaine

HANOI, Vietnam - Nguyen Huong Giang loves to party but loathes hangovers, so she ends her whiskey benders by tossing back shots of rhino horn ground with water on a special ceramic plate. Her father gave her the 4-inch brown horn as a gift, claiming it cures everything from headaches to cancer. Vietnam has become so obsessed with the fingernail-like substance that it now sells for more than cocaine. "I don't know how much it costs," said Giang, 24, after showing off the horn in her high-rise apartment overlooking the capital, Hanoi.

A small quantity of white powder recovered at the Beverly Hilton hotel room in L.A. where singer Whitney Houston died has been identified as cocaine, sources tell TMZ. Cocaine and heart disease were contributing factors in her Feb. 11 accidental drowning death. Meanwhile, mom, Cissy Houston, 78, says in her first interview since the tragedy that she wishes things were different. "There's nothing I can do about it," she told MY9 TV (WWOR), a Fox affiliate in Secaucus, N.J.. "There's nothing nobody else can do about it. If I thought I could do something to bring her back, that's exactly what I'd do, but I know that's impossible.

LOS ANGELES - Whitney Houston was a chronic cocaine user who had the drug in her system when she drowned in a hotel bathtub, coroner's officials said Thursday after releasing autopsy findings that also noted that heart disease contributed to her death. The disclosure ended weeks of speculation about what killed the Grammy-winning singer Feb. 11, on the eve of the Grammy Awards. Houston was found submerged in the bathtub of her room at the Beverly Hilton Hotel, and her death was ruled accidental.

BACK WITH THE Los Angeles Dodgers after a yearlong absence, reliever Ronald Belisario said yesterday that he was prevented from entering the United States last year because he tested positive for cocaine. The positive drug test also resulted in a 25-game suspension issued by Major League Baseball that Belisario will serve at the start of the upcoming season. Standing in front of his locker before the pitchers and catchers' first workout of the spring, Belisario said he didn't have a cocaine problem and that he had ingested the drug only once.

ROME - Lawyers for survivors of the capsized cruise ship Costa Concordia pressed Saturday for new drug tests on the ship's captain after traces of cocaine were reportedly found on the outside of a hair sample. But the consultant who did the analyses for prosecutors stood by results, which found no presence of the drug in urine samples or within the hair of Capt. Francesco Schettino. The Italian consumer-protection group Codacons is representing some survivors of the shipwreck of the cruise liner, which rammed a reef near a Tuscan island the night of Jan. 13 and turned on its side.

Six alleged members of a drug-smuggling ring have been arrested, and 40 pounds of cocaine have been seized in Bensalem, police said Tuesday. The cocaine, with an estimated street value of $8 million, was brought from Mexico to a local warehouse, township police said. The suspects were arraigned Monday on charges that include felony drug-trafficking, which carries a minimum sentence of 10 years for a conviction. They were sent to the Bucks County prison after bail was set at $1 million each.

Six alleged members of a drug-smuggling ring have been arrested, and 40 pounds of cocaine has been seized in Bensalem, police said today. The cocaine, which has an estimated street value of $8 million, was brought from Mexico to a local warehouse, township police said. The men, arrested Monday morning, include two Philadelphians, three Lehigh County residents, and a Texan. Two are citizens of the Dominican Republic. One is a Mexican citizen. They were arraigned Monday on charges that include felony drug-trafficking, which carries a minimum sentence of 10 years for a conviction.

Today's scheduled sentencing of Katoya Jones - who admitted letting the killers of two people at the Piazza at Schmidts complex into the secured building where she lived - was postponed until March 7. But even then it's unlikely that Jones, 29, will learn how much time she will spend in prison for her role in the 2009 botched drug robbery that ended in the shootings of party planner Rian Thal, 34, and friend Timothy Gilmore, 40. Common Pleas...

Federal officers seized 130 pounds of cocaine - worth $4 million on the street - from three unattended duffel bags at Philadelphia International Airport, officials said Wednesday. The bags arrived Sunday on a flight from the Dominican Republic, said Customs and Border Protection spokesman Steve Sapp. A drug-sniffing dog detected narcotics in the bags, and 52 bricks of cocaine were found inside. No one from the flight was arrested, and the investigation is continuing, Sapp said.

BEARS RECEIVER Sam Hurd was locked up in federal custody yesterday in Chicago as his stunned teammates learned he had been charged with trying to set up a drug-dealing network following his arrest with more than a pound of cocaine. U.S. Magistrate Young Kim ordered Hurd held until at least today while prosecutors and defense attorneys work out bond details before he is sent to Texas to face charges. The handcuffed Hurd declined comment to a reporter before the hearing. Asked if he was still a member of the Bears, he said: "As far as I know.