New Zealand drug smugglers caught red handed by their terrible boating skills – TheLiberal.ie – Our News, Your Views

New Zealand drug smugglers caught red handed by their terrible boating skills




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A group of drug smugglers in New Zealand have been caught red handed after their haphazard boating skills were reported by suspicious locals.

The result was New Zealand’s largest ever methamphetamine with a street value of €307 million and a weight of 494kg.

Locals contacted Police after noticing a group of men acting suspiciously around the area for weeks. Locals also discovered an abandoned boat at remote 90 Mile Beach on Sunday.

Police said that the criminals had tried and failed to sail off the beach and then offered locals cash to help them.

When Police arrived at the scene a vehicle driven by the drug traffickers sped past resulting in a brief car chase. Two men, aged 26 and 31, were arrested.

Shortly after a campervan was stopped and searched. A man aged 19 was found to be carrying multiple suitcases containing zip-lock bags full of drugs totalling 448kg.

Police found a GPS device in the first vehicle which led them to sand dunes where another 46kg of drugs were discovered.

“What is so great about this is that it’s not only the result of hard work by the Northland police, but it’s the result of information we got from the community,” Superintendent Russell Le Prou said in a statement.

“We received notification of several cases of suspicious behaviour in the past few weeks, and that has allowed us to get to this point.”


The three men appeared in court this morning charged with importing and possessing class A drugs for supply.

 

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