Smugglers tried to hide cocaine within a shipment of 33 tons of charcoal through one of Mexico’s coastal states, according to recent disclosures from the Naval Secretariat.
The seizure took place in the port city of Altamira where Mexico’s Naval Secretariat seized almost 2,400 bags of charcoal in recent weeks and subsequently held an event where authorities crushed the coal and then set it on fire.
Authorities claimed that the charcoal itself was “contaminated.” The tactic points to another attempt by criminal organizations to conceal drugs to avoid detection.
In December, a group of Sinaloa Cartel smugglers hid more than 660 pounds of fentanyl pills inside a shipment of coconuts. Several of the coconuts in that shipment were hollow and stuffed with drugs.
Editor’s Note: Breitbart Texas traveled to Mexico City and the states of Tamaulipas, Coahuila, and Nuevo León to recruit citizen journalists willing to risk their lives and expose the cartels silencing their communities. The writers would face certain death at the hands of the various cartels that operate in those areas including the Gulf Cartel and Los Zetas if a pseudonym were not used. Breitbart Texas’ Cartel Chronicles are published in both English and their original Spanish. This article was written by “C.P. Mireles” from Tamaulipas.