Seven tons of cocaine valued at $190 million entered the country in the right hands in Miami, the U.S. Coast Guard reported.
Several Coast Guard cutters intercepted about 14,000 pounds of cocaine in seven seizures off the coasts of Mexico and Central and South America over the course of just 30 days. The drugs arrived Tuesday in Port Everglades, according to a press release.
Diligence, a 210-foot cutter homeported in Wilmington, N.C., was responsible for seizing about 960 kilograms of cocaine, the Coast Guard reported. The 270-foot cutter Northland, out of Portsmouth, Va., seized the most cocaine of five vessels – about 2,871 kilograms.
Hamilton, a 418-foot cutter homeported in Charleston, S.C., was responsible for two seizures totaling 1,931 kilograms of cocaine. The cutters Venturous (St. Petersburg, Fla.) and Harriet Lane (Portsmouth) jointly accounted for a little more than 600 kilograms.
“It truly is a team effort stopping these drugs from entering the United States, but more important than the drugs themselves are the arrests and the linkages these cases represent and the steps closer to dismantling the criminal networks that tried to move them into the United States,” said Capt. Mark Gordon, cutter Hamilton’s commanding officer.
Gordon continued: “These transnational criminal organizations would have used the illicit proceeds from these drugs to not only expand their networks but to continue to sow violence, corruption, and a break down in the rule of law throughout the world.”
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© 2018 The News & Observer (Raleigh, N.C.)
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