Customs officers at New York’s JFK International Airport felt strange about a passenger’s wheelchair that couldn’t turn. As it turned out, the wheel contained cocaine.
Cocaine valued at US$450,000 or the equivalent of Rp. 7 billion, the attempt was made to be smuggled into the United States from the Dominican Republic. This incident occurred on Thursday (10/11).
Reported by detikTravel from AP, Sunday (11/20/2022), US customs officials immediately confiscated cocaine as proof. Airport security officers also secured the woman in a wheelchair filled with cocaine.
The suspicions of Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) officers began when they saw a woman in a wheelchair who was having difficulty moving her. The wheelchair seemed unable to turn.
Finally, the officer put the wheelchair through the X-ray machine. The CBP officer’s suspicions were confirmed. An anomaly has been found on the wheels of the wheelchair.
When officers dismantled it, they found a package containing various types of drugs cocaine hidden inside the wheel section. The total weight of the cocaine found was 12.7 kilograms!
The passenger, Emelinda Paulino De Rivas, who used a wheelchair with cocaine, was immediately stopped by the police on charges of drug dealing. Emelinda was also threatened with the death penalty for the smuggling attempt cocaine That.
“CBP officers are working tactically with our partners to identify criminal international drug networks attempting to import lethal drugs into our area,” said Francis J. Russo, director of CBP New York.
“CBP’s mission is to secure our borders and ports of entry 24 hours a day, 365 days a year to prevent these dangerous drugs from entering and potentially killing our family, friends and relatives,” Russo said.
Watch a video “3 foreign nationals arrested by BNNP become cocaine dealers in Canggu-Seminyak“
[Gambas:Video 20detik]
(wsw/wsw)
