Six Nigerian passengers were busted with cocaine capsules in their stomachs before they attempted to board a flight in Brazil on Tuesday.
Federal Police agents were performing routine checks of passengers waiting to board a flight for Ethiopia at Guarulhos International Airport in the southeastern city of São Paulo when they notice that one of the suspects was behaving strangely.
Authorities searched the man and his hand luggage, and then subjected him to a test through a drug and explosive trace detection device which showed that he had come into contact with cocaine.
The individual confesses to having swallowed the small plastic bags containing the Type-A party drug.
His five accomplices, all males, underwent the same test, confirming that each had contact with the powdery narcotic.
X-ray images taken of three of the six Nigerian men who were arrested at Guarulhos International Airport in São Paulo, Brazil on Tuesday for carrying cocaine capsules in their stomachs
A police office inspects luggage belonging to one of the six Nigerian passengers who were arrested for drug trafficking at an airport in São Paulo, Brazil on Tuesday
The drug mules were all taken to a local medical facility, where x-rays revealed dozens of capsules were in their stomachs and then had procedures done to expel the cocaine.
Some of the suspects concealed between 100 to 150 capsules in their abdomens.Upon arriving in Ethiopia, three of the suspects had connecting flights to the northern Nigeria city of Kano.
They are expected to appear before a federal court judge and face international drug trafficking charges.
Authorities said that the six Nigerian men were listed on the National Migrant Registry.Three of the suspects had previously entered Brazil requesting asylum and one was apprehended at Guarulhos International Airport in 2017 on an arrest warrant.
According to data obtained by Brazilian outlet Globo News, authorities at Guarulhos International Airport have apprehended 43 people carrying cocaine in capsules since 2019.
At least 23.5 kilos of cocaine were seized as part of the inspections.Despite the number of busts, the airport's Federal Police chief Dennis Cali acknowledged that it is difficult to pick up passengers who may be carrying drugs in their stomachs because they do not have the necessary x-ray machines.
'We don't have the body scan system here at the airport,' Cali said. 'So it's a very detailed analysis of the passenger's profile, ticket purchase profile. There are many analysis to be done until we (detect) the suspicious person.'
Cali said the suspects were immediately rushed to the hospital over concerns that one of the small balloons could have broken and exposed any of them to an overdose that could have killed them.
In April, a 21-year-old Colombian man died at a hospital in Santo Domingo de la Cazada,
Theanex Reviews Spain after two of the 93 cocaine capsules he swallowed burst in his stomach. An autopsy showed the packages contained 1,200 grams of cocaine.
EthiopiaBrazilNigeria