Seven arrested after dismantling one of the largest drug gangs

The National Police has dismantled one of the most important drug trafficking networks operating in Asturias and Galicia with the arrest of seven people, five of whom have been imprisoned, the seizure of 7 kilograms of cocaine and the dismantling of a laboratory for the extraction and conversion of liquid drugs into solids.

Police sources have reported this Friday that this police operation has been carried out in Asturias, Galicia and Madrid and that seven people have been arrested as a result of it in Oviedo, Gijón, Mieres, Villaviciosa, A Coruña and Alcorcón.

The detainees had a high degree of specialization, carried out their internal communications under encryption and used different security techniques in their movements..

The investigations began in October of last year after one of the main drug traffickers from the Cantabrian coast who, based in A Coruña, was located in Asturias, had contacts with a man who was related to one of the most important anti-drug operations important of those carried out in Oviedo and which culminated in 2012 with the intervention of 37 kilos of “speed”.

The dismantled organization, according to the police, had four recipients of the drug in Asturias who were arrested on July 26 in Oviedo, Gijón, Mieres and Argüero (Villaviciosa), all of them with police records for similar acts..

The main suspect in the plot traveled from A Coruña every week to these towns, which he did in a car equipped with a hidden hole for transporting the drug, or with the collaboration of second vehicles in shuttle work..

The network supplied the drug in Madrid, from an organization of Colombian origin, which in turn was related to a seizure of 130 kilos of cocaine that took place on March 20 inside the ship Iraklis, in the Gijón port of El Musel.

Investigators consider that the dismantled organization therefore had a second route of entry for narcotic material through the ports of Gijón and Avilés and that it was also in charge of its concealment and subsequent treatment for sale.

On July 25, the National Police intercepted the car of the main person under investigation in the plot in Gijón, and hidden in the hole in the front bumper found six packages weighing approximately seven kilos of cocaine..

At the time of the arrest, those investigated were immersed in the negotiation for the acquisition of a consignment of heroin which, according to the police, was frustrated as a result of this intervention.

As a result of the different entry and search procedures, authorized by the Oviedo Investigating Court number three, the National Police also proceeded to dismantle a laboratory for the extraction and conversion of liquid or diluted cocaine to cocaine hydrochloride that was hidden in a urbanization on the outskirts of the Coruña town of Sada.

In addition to the drugs and chemical precursors, the police seized a pistol, a bulletproof vest, 7 kilograms of cocaine, seven precision scales, 17,400 euros in cash, a machete, a geolocation device, as well as 18 telephones, 5 vehicles and accounting entries.