CNN – A 28-year-old man is arrested at U.S.Customs and Border Protection in Southern California after authorities say they found thousands of pounds of drugs hidden inside a shipment of jalapeño paste.I got into trouble.
According to a Thursday news release, on Wednesday, agency personnel at the Otay Mesa Cargo Facility encountered the driver of a commercial semi-truck carrying a cargo of what was declared to be jalapeño paste.
According to authorities, the vehicle, luggage and driver had valid border crossing cards and were sent to a secondary control area for further investigation.
There, a K9 unit scanned the delivery and alerted officers to conduct a more thorough inspection of the semi-truck.”Upon further investigation, CBP officers identified a total of 349 packages of suspected barrels of jalapeño paste.were discovered and seized,” the release said in a press release.
The contents of the package were examined and determined to contain 3,161 pounds of methamphetamine and 522 pounds of cocaine, the agency said.
Images from the agency revealed large reddish-orange barrels containing the packages, cleverly surrounded by jalapeño paste.The narcotics have an estimated street value exceeding $10.4 million, as indicated in the release.
Homeland Security agents took the driver into custody and seized both the drugs and the trailer, officials said.In 2023, the federal government seized more than 140,000 pounds of methamphetamine and more than 81,000 pounds of cocaine, according to federal data.
Border officials seized the drugs and the semi-truck, and the driver was turned over to the Department of Homeland Security for further investigation.Initially, no further information about the driver was provided.
Port Director Rosa Hernandez stated that the agency’s K-9 teams play a crucial role in counter-narcotics operations, offering a dependable mobile detection capability. She emphasized the agency’s commitment to safeguarding communities and thwarting the expansion of transnational criminal organizations through continuous seizures.
