The National Police has dealt a severe blow to cocaine trafficking in Spain from Alicante. Agents from the Drug and Organized Crime Unit (UDYCO) of the Alicante Police Station, in collaboration with their counterparts from Malaga, have intervened one of the largest shipments in the country from containers already unloaded.

The 4,300 kilos of drugs were hidden in a shipment of bananas from Ecuador. The device yielded five detainees from an organization that had taken root in the province of Alicante and is still open, with which new arrests are not ruled out.. The operation has also had the collaboration of the Customs Surveillance Service of the Tax Agency.

At the beginning of last June, the investigators received information from the Interior Attaché Office of the Spanish Embassy in the countries of Bulgaria, Ukraine, Albania, North Macedonia and Cyprus, warning of the establishment of a major criminal organization made up of citizens of Albanian origin dedicated to trafficking cocaine in large quantities.

An arduous investigation began that paid off on June 23, when agents detected a shipment of several containers from Ecuador in the port of Malaga.. he was carrying bananas but the cops suspected it was a cover.

For this reason, a discreet surveillance of the cargo was carried out, which would travel in two trucks from Malaga to Alicante. Hours later, the trucks arrived at an industrial warehouse in a polygon on the outskirts of the city.. The police units verified how the members of the criminal organization unloaded the containers disguised with reflective work clothes, thus giving the image of regular and legal workers in the area.

It was then that the investigators made the decision to inspect the cargo of both trucks and when it was discovered that in addition to the bananas declared at customs, they were hiding almost 400 packages of cocaine that yielded a total gross weight of more than 4,800 kilos, resulting in a net weight of 4,318 kilos..

“The success of this operation lies in the fact that coordination and work between officials from the Provincial Police Stations of Alicante and Malaga, Group 1 of the Special Response against Organized Crime Levante and the Combined Customs Surveillance Unit of Malaga have prevailed,” the police sources consulted highlight.

Both the ship and the vehicles used by the members of the criminal organization were registered in the name of apparently legal companies in order to go unnoticed, hinder the police investigation and give overtones of legality to the money obtained from the sale of the drug, more specifically they would use a vehicle purchase-sale company that was in the name of one of the detainees of Spanish origin.

Investigators attribute to this person, also detained, a previous role as a possible front man for other criminal organizations in the coastal area, including links to front companies for the rental of ships and vehicles.