Joint operation of the Tax Agency and the National Police

• The operation has resulted in eight detainees, four of them in the city of Vigo, to which they had traveled from the south of the peninsula to provide security for the transfer of the substance to the Costa del Sol.

May 5, 2023.- Officials from the Tax Agency and agents from the National Police have seized two tons of cocaine from a criminal organization that operated from South America through the port of Vigo. The operation has resulted in eight detainees, four of them in the city of Vigo, to which they had traveled from the south of the peninsula to provide security for the transfer of the substance to the Costa del Sol. Eight entries and searches have been carried out simultaneously in the province of Malaga, where the other four arrests have been made, in which 58,000 euros in cash have been seized.

They took advantage of the fresh fruit trade routes

The investigations began in the summer when officials from the Tax Agency and agents from the National Police shared information about an organization that planned to introduce a significant amount of cocaine through the port of Vigo. It would be an organization that would have been very active in the port of Algeciras, led by a historic drug trafficker who operated in the Campo de Gibraltar, and that now intended to open a new route for the introduction of narcotics through the north of the peninsula, taking advantage of the routes fresh fruit trades with South America.

By the customs authorities active in the port of Vigo, intensifying controls in order to reaffirm the position of the Vigo area as a territory impermeable to criminal organizations, those who would be behind this organization were detected. From that moment, led by the Anti-Drug Prosecutor's Office of the National Court, joint investigations were coordinated with the National Police with the aim of arresting those responsible.

The investigations carried out have made it possible to intercept two shipments of nearly two tons of cocaine hydrochloride. The first intervention took place on March 4, originally carried out by the Colombian Anti-Narcotics Directorate when 1.3 tons of cocaine were seized in the port of Cartagena (Colombia). It was the subsequent investigation that allowed us to conclude that said narcotic was the property of this organization. The second of the shipments would have been intercepted on April 25 upon the arrival of the container at the port of Vigo. On this occasion, 650 kilos of 'cocaine hydrochloride' with a purity of 90% were seized.

In both cases, the substance was hidden inside two pallets of bananas, taking advantage of the usual commercial routes that operate in the city, leaving the criminal organization neutralized at the moment the first and only shipment that would have arrived at the port was intercepted. from Vigo.