$270 million worth of cocaine found on Air France flight

[Tx4obama]

Source: CNN

(CNN) -- There was something odd about the 30 suitcases that showed up on a flight from Venezuela. The colorful bags weren't registered to any of the passengers on the plane.

When French officials them up, they discovered why -- 1.3 tons of pure cocaine were stuffed inside the anonymous bags.

The street value of the stash? About 200 million Euros, or $270 million.



Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2013/09/22/world/europe/air-france-cocaine-found/index.html

[MADem]

1. Flight from Venezuela eh?

How long before Thick Nicky Maduro claims it's an evil CIA plot to make VZ look bad....?

[joshcryer]

3. The National Guard is supposed to assure this sort of thing doesn't happen.

I like this bit from the article:

The country's Public Ministry said prosecutors will investigate the Counterdrug Command of the National Guard at Simon Bolivar International Airport to see if any criminal activity took place.

Erm, you just tried to smuggle a ton of cocaine into France. I'm pretty sure "criminal activity took place."

FARC is likely behind this shipment, too, at least as the source.

[Comrade Grumpy]

12. And the US Border Patrol is supposed to ensure that drugs don't enter the country.

Yet they do.

[MADem]

19. Well, this flight wasn't coming to America....it went to France. The FRENCH bagged this shipment.

As another poster noted, there's a three day rule in USA when it comes to VZ aircraft; perhaps this sort of thing has something to do with that.

[joshcryer]

22. not by anonymous bags on a public airline

[bobGandolf]

29. Too busy looking for pot plants. n/t

[MADem]

16. I guess it's getting tougher to skim off the top of the oil industry....

They've gotta branch out to keep their Boligarchian Revolutionary asses in clover, I reckon...

[joshcryer]

2. Proof positive the Venezuelan National Guard is running drugs.

Now we know why Venezuela made that 1 day request to have flight clearance when the requirement is 3 days notice. They wanted to distract from the looming story of their guys losing out big.

Of course no one of portent will be prosecuted over this. A few baggage handlers, maybe. But no one big.

Interesting that EU has a taste for cocaine like the US.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

7. So many ready to convict on no evidence. That's why loony conspiracy theories have such a hold.

Proof positive? Nonsense.

[Comrade Grumpy]

13. That's a leap. Unless you can show complicity running to the top of the organization.

It could well be crooked individual officers. God knows every other law enforcement or military agency in the region has been touched by drug corruption.

[joshcryer]

28. Bouterse?

Aeropostal?



http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/27/world/americas/venezuela-is-cocaine-hub-despite-its-claims.html

I'd cite the US government's names of people in the top levels of government but it'd be dismissed.

Instead just look at the paper trail. This sort of operation isn't going to work without the national guard being in on it.

And unless leading guard members are arrested then one must conclude it does go to the top, because that makes the top complicit for allowing its members to act this way.

It's just like the BANDES scandal where not one person in Venezuela has been arrested over it (an operation that had to have people complicit with the leading BANDES official; who btw was a chavista, who found herself in Miami in handcuffs).

[TexasTowelie]

4. Was former hand surgeon Michael Brown on board the flight?

When opportunity knocks--just saying.

[JustAnotherGen]

5. Whoa

1.3 TONS of pure coke in 30 suitcases. That's just a lot of blow. You could get stoned just by being in proximity to that. That's bananas.

[drynberg]

6. FOR MORE THAN A QUARTER OF A $ BILLION, WOULDN'T YA USE A LITTLE MORE NODDLE THAT THIS

Smells, like a set up to me...now I'm not blaming the CIA, etc. just sayin'...

[dotymed]

9. No doubt, this doesn't make sense.

Only if the evidence room is robbed shortly will a criminal circle be complete.
To place tons of coke on a flight, with no way for the couriers to get it makes no sense.
I can see a possible huge fuck-up if a baggage handler was supposed to retrieve this and was unable to. Thirty pieces of colorful luggage would seemingly be very hard to snag and hide/smuggle from the airport.
That is a huge (to me) sum of money to risk on a half-assed plan without a contingency.

It seems that it is a red herring to implicate the hated Socialist state or an "apple dumpling gang" of smugglers is soon to die.

It does show us ordinary folk how much cash (drugs) the wealthy have to play with while food stamps are cut and our capitalist government is under threat of going out of business.

[joshcryer]

27. They tote the baggages to the handling area.

They could easily swap out the bags en route. The colorful nature of the bags would make it easy enough. Load up one cart with the regular bags, load up another with the colorful bags. 6 people were arrested, presumably the baggage handlers in question.

[MADem]

18. Yeah, because the CIA runs around behind the NG's back and spends a fortune on such stupidity.

Sometimes a corrupt government is a corrupt government--without any help at all.

Maduro is making an ass of himself all on his own, inserting "penis" references into biblical passages and mistaking the Puerto Rican for the Cuban flag.

He's a moronic Mister Malaprop all on his own--he can't even keep toilet paper on the nation's bathroom rolls, never mind arepa flour on the shelves.

The country is a sewer of corrupt assholes in power, and the National Guard is among them. Why is this surprising?

[joshcryer]

26. Not if it's worked before.

It looks like a simple operation. Stash the coke in "added on" baggage, don't actually assign the baggage to anyone, when it lands, unload the anonymous baggage tagged a certain way and sneak it off the airport.

All it requires on the receiving end are baggage handlers able to put it aside somewhere until it can be taken out of the airport (those baggage handlers could be bribed before hand or the person in charge of them could be bribed to allow certain handlers access). The anonymously tagged bags won't be picked up by the manifest because no one will be complaining about bags they're not getting. The airport would overlook it because they just assume the passengers are getting their added on baggage. In fact, the baggage handlers could simply say the bags were delivered. No one could prove otherwise.

On the sending end, however, it requires baggage handlers to be in on it, it requires the people doing the paperwork for all these anonymous baggages to be in on it, it requires the national guard to turn a blind eye to it, it requires the airport security people to allow unknown baggage to be loaded on to a plane (they should inspect every bag for the purpose of preventing someone from easily loading a bomb on board). It requires a few dozen people at minimum for it to work. The only way I see that happening is if the national guard was in on it.

[Blue_Tires]

31. Yeah, it would take a lot of planning in both cities to make this work...

Although I'm not sure why they would send it this way...Even with this much coordination, there's a fair chance that Air France or CDG security catch it anyway...Seems like a smarter move to route it through one of the smaller European airports with less security...

Or if it has to go to France, why not put it on a cargo ship to Marseille like all the other dopers? I'm thinking someone was either really foolish or really desperate...

[daleo]

8. Amazing that 30 suitcases of anything could be worth a quarter billion

Especially something that grows wild on the ground.

[avaistheone1]

32. Yeah that is kind of crazy.

[jessie04]

10. Is coke still that popular ?

seems to have decreased afaik.

[Comrade Grumpy]

11. It is in Europe. Not as popular here in the US as it used to be, though.

And not as newsworthy as it once was. We have other drugs to be scandalized about these days: pain pills, Molly.

[Posteritatis]

14. Probably varies place to place. It's still popular in rural areas in my neck of the woods

Part of the issue there is that the relative price is down a lot from a few decades ago, when it was "god's proof that you have too much money."

More conventional stuff like pot or prescription medications are both much more common of course (and thank goodness for that), but I was still surprised when I found out how popular coke was in the wide spot in the road where I grew up.

[jessie04]

15. Interesting.

thanks....live and learn.

[MADem]

17. You can make crack from it.... nt

[Blasphemer]

20. Either someone screwed up big or someone was set up

30 suitcases of no known origin? There's got to be an expectation of someone in France getting those through unchecked. I could see a low level player if it was one suitcase but 30? We'll never know the real story.

[BlueJazz]

21. Jessee...we need to start cooking...

[cynzke]

23. Start Checking

Retailers for big suitcase purchase!

[DontTreadOnMe]

24. $270 million? what broken out into dime bag prices...

2600 lbs of cocaine

In Columbia, the price of cocaine is about $2000 per pound.
In Venezuela, the price of cocaine is about $3500 per pound.

So the "real"cost of the cocaine seized is roughly $5.2 million to $9.1 million

now, about that $270 million figure...??? street price!

[Tx4obama]

25. I don't know anything about cocaine... BUT...

I think they said on the news that it was 'pure'

So, isn't it usually cut with something before it goes out onto the street?

Maybe that is how they arrived at the higher dollar amount

[KurtNYC]

30. I love that you get an ad for a private jet company next to this OP !

[GreenStormCloud]

33. Somebody is going to get dead over this, if they aren't already. N/T

[dipsydoodle]

34. I reckon it was loaded onto the wrong plane.

Reminds me of : breakfast London, lunch New York, luggage Bahrain.