Dismantled an international criminal organization dedicated to heroin trafficking in heated vehicles

Agents of the Spanish Civil Guard, in a joint operation with the Spanish National Police, have broken up in Madrid and Galicia an international criminal organization allegedly dedicated to heroin trafficking in heated vehicles. Eight searches have been carried out and more than 13 kilograms of the drug have been seized and 11 members of the organization that operated from Madrid and A Coruña have been arrested. They used sophisticated systems to hide the drug in “heated” vehicles in which they transported the merchandise.

The investigation began at the beginning of the year when the investigators detected the presence in the city of A Coruña of a man who was dedicated to the distribution of heroin and who had extensive infrastructure for the distribution of large quantities of the drug in Galicia.

The agents were able to verify that he had the collaboration of more people who were dedicated to distributing the drug in different parts of the city and its metropolitan area, as well as an elderly woman who ran a distribution point in the center of the capital. Galician.

The organization also had transporters who were dedicated to the transfer of drugs, directly to Galicia or through Madrid, using different vehicles. These vehicles were equipped with sophisticated “caleteo” systems to hide the drugs, with which they made police action difficult in the event of being intercepted.

X-rays to find the “cove” with heroin

In the month of July, a transport of the organization was detected, bound for Galicia, in which the agents suspected that they could be transporting the heroin, having to collaborate with the Customs Surveillance Service to, through radiological means, locate the exact place of concealment. In the “cove”, located in a false bottom, they located 20 packages of heroin impregnated with resin with a total weight of 10 kilograms.

During the investigation they also detected that the organization had members in charge of providing them with both vehicles and documentation to be able to go unnoticed in the city, with the ringleader using up to ten different vehicles. In addition, those arrested took extreme security measures during the transfer of the drug, even using technical means to detect if they were being monitored by the police.

The person in charge of the organization in Madrid to go unnoticed when traveling, since he had a ban on entry into Schengen territory in force, used false documentation and posed as a judicial expert.

Once the researchers verified the role played by each member of the organization, a device was established in which eight entries and searches were carried out at homes, six in Galicia – four in A Coruña, one in Carballo and another in Sada. – and two in Madrid.

The records have seized three kilograms of heroin hidden in a storage room used by the person in charge of the organization in Galicia, other narcotic substances – one kilogram of hashish, 500 grams of marijuana and 20 grams of hashish -, 57,000 euros in cash, 900 American dollars, precision scales and tools for drug manipulation and adulteration. During the operation, a geolocation device, a frequency inhibitor, false documentation and six vehicles have been seized.