The women hid more than 60 drug packages between a wig and their natural hair
Photo: Panama Attorney General
On Friday, June 3, at the Tocumen international airport in Panama, the anti-narcotics authorities captured a woman of Colombian nationality, after suspecting that she was carrying cocaine. The traveler, who was making a stopover at that air terminal because her final destination was Madrid, Spain, remains under the control of the Police of that country where they expect her to answer for drug trafficking crimes.
According to the Anti-Drug Prosecutor of that country, Xiomara Rodríguez, the woman was separated from the group because the officers suspected her hairstyle.
“A citizen of Colombian origin arrived, this woman She was approached as a profile by the police units in order to verify some type of irregularity that could be seen in her hair”, said the official.
Noticing that there was something suspicious about the woman’s hairstyle, the authorities put her through the scanner and detected that, among her hair, there were some small caches, so they set out to check her hair. Indeed, between the braids of her natural hair and a wig she was wearing, 68 drug tablets were attached.
“After passing through the scanners, identified it as an unprecedented modality, for the first time in Panama, 68 cylindrical black wrappers were found”, revealed the prosecutor in charge.
The director of the accusing and investigative entity pointed out that, when analyzing the inside of the wrappers, she noticed that they had a white powder, to which the respective tests were carried out that showed that it was cocaine. After this, the woman, of whom they did not give further details, was prohibited from boarding the next flight she had bound for the Spanish capital and was arrested.
Prosecutor Rodríguez pointed out that the woman was brought before a court of guarantees for alleged international drug trafficking. For now, the authorities have not revealed more information about the woman or the criminal organization that sent her to Spain to carry out this task.
In the images released by the Attorney General’s Office, the officers carefully checking the woman’s hair, until they identify that under the wig there are some small blocks. When removing her wig, they notice that her natural hair enters, c Like a braid, the drug shipment was not specified by the Panamanian authorities.
Apparently, this modality is not new to the criminal organization, since hours later Later, at the same air terminal, a woman appeared to whom the officers also identified a strange appearance in her hair. Upon reviewing her, they realized that she also had some drug-carrying wrappers attached to her .
In the second case, The woman was also Colombian, and the only difference from the one she was captured before is that she was carrying 67 cocaine caches, that is, one less. According to information from the AFP news agency, this second identified female was also brought before the Panamanian justice system.
Cocaine seized in Cartagena
Recently, in the Colombian Caribbean, the Colombian Navy confirmed that 1,884 kilograms were seizedof cocaine hydrochloride in two operations carried out in Cartagena, Bolívar against organizations dedicated to drug trafficking. According to the authorities, this shipment was valued at more than 113 million dollars.
In the first operation of the day it was possible to intercept “a suspicious boat” that would have departed from the Colombian coast transporting the narcotics. The Navy deployed the Rapid Reaction Unit of the Cartagena Coastguard Station in the area.
The boat was towed by the authorities to the Coastguard Station of Cartagena, where the inspection process was carried out. A total of 18 tulas were found, which contained 567 rectangular packages. When subjected to the “Approved Preliminary Identification Tests (PIPH)”, the Technical Investigation Corps (CTI) of the Prosecutor’s Office verified that it was 567 kilograms of cocaine hydrochloride.