Wild second a £196million cocaine cargo sure for Europe goes up in flames
Police seized an incredible 9.5 tonnes of cocaine found in a banana shipment – the white powder was bound for Belgium but authorities found it and set it on fire
A whopping 9.5 tonnes of cocaine were found hidden in a banana shipment by police and dramatic pictures captured the moment it went up in flames.
Authorities in the Dominican Republic confiscated the lucrative white powder saying the £196m haul was the largest in the country’s history, far outstripping a seizure of 2.6 tonnes in 2006.
A total of ten suspects were detained after the shipment arrived at the port of Caucedo in Santo Domingo, the country’s capital. It was bound from Belgium after departing from Guatemala.
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A remarkable 47 tons of drugs have been seized by authorities this year.
“Early investigations show that a container carrying bananas arrived from Guatemala,” spokesperson for the Dominican Republic’s anti-drug agency Carlos Devers said according to The Guardian. “Many unknown individuals tried to transfer the drugs to another container that would be shipped on a vessel to Belgium.”
In an unrelated incident in the UK this month, a drug-smuggling gang was jailed after cocaine with a street value of £200 million was intercepted in a shipment of bananas. It was the UK’s largest haul of the drugs at the time.
Crime boss Petko Zhutev was in charge of taking delivery of the Colombian drugs at a London warehouse in February 2021 – unaware it had already been seized by border officials at Portsmouth.
Midway through a retrial at the Old Bailey, Zhutev, 39, who entered the UK from Bulgaria in January 2021, admitted importation of a class A drug having previously been cleared of possession of a revolver and ammunition with intent to endanger life.
He was jailed at the Old Bailey for 27 years alongside four others, after Judge Rebecca Trowler KC said he played a “leading role” in the importation.
Erik Muci, 45, of Haynes Road, Hornchurch, and Olsi Ebeja, 40, of Malta Street, Islington, were found guilty of importation at the conclusion of the retrial and were sentenced to 33 years’ and 17 years’ imprisonment respectively.
Muci, described by a judge as a “key organiser”, was jailed for 26 years for the importation and given a further consecutive sentence of seven years’ imprisonment for the supply of class A drugs, after police recovered 33kg of cocaine from a property on Caledonian Road, north London.
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