Spanish police said they arrested a 66-year-old Chilean at Barcelona airport after discovering the cast on his broken leg was made of cocaine.The man also had cocaine hidden in six beer cans that had been emptied, packed with drugs and resealed, and inside the legs of two small folding stools. Altogether, he was carrying about 11 pounds of the drug.The arrest was made on Wednesday as the man arrived from Santiago, Chile.The man’s leg was broken and investigators are looking into the possibility that he deliberately broke it in order to smuggle in the drug.Police spokesman Jose Antonio Nin said he knew of cases in which smugglers had concealed cocaine underneath casts but this was the first time officials had seen a cast made entirely of compressed cocaine. It weighed about 2.2 pounds.Police detected the drug by spraying the cast with a chemical that turns bright blue when it comes in contact with cocaine.The man was taken to hospital after the cast was removed.
Spain is a major European gateway for cocaine from Latin America and airport officials pay especially close attention to passengers on flights from Peru, Colombia and Chile.A UN report in 2008 revealed it had become the biggest consumer of cocaine in continental Europe, and is one of the world’s top users of the drug.
Posts
0 comments:
Post a Comment