Authorities in Mexico encountered a new tactic where cartel smugglers disguise shipments of fentanyl as protein powder in shipments bound for the California border.
Information from Mexico’s National Guard revealed that, on Wednesday, authorities in Culiacan, Sinaloa, seized 200,000 pills of fentanyl that were disguised as bottles of protein powder. In less than a week, authorities found close to a million fentanyl pills being shipped in similar protein powder packages. The shipments were about to be trafficked to the United States.
The seizure occurred at a shipping company where National Guardsmen used a police dog to sniff the packages. The dog pointed to two boxes of protein powder that authorities took aside and inspected. During the inspection, they found that the boxes contained bottles labeled as vegetable protein powder. In actuality, the bottles contained fentanyl pills. In total, authorities seized 200,000 pills weighing approximately 45 pounds. The package was addressed to a home in the Mexican border city of Tijuana, Baja California.
The seizure comes just days after authorities made a similar seizure on July 8. In this incident, authorities in Culiacan seized another 600,000 fentanyl pills disguised as protein powder at a different shipping company. In that case, a police dog pointed to six boxes containing protein powder bottles. The boxes were filled with blue fentanyl pills.
According to information released from Mexico’s National Guard, that shipment was also being sent to Tijuana.
The ongoing seizures of fentanyl come when Mexico’s President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador repeatedly claimed that his country does not produce nor consume fentanyl. Despite Lopez Obrador’s claims, the U.S. Department of Justice has criminally charged members of the Sinaloa Cartel — claiming they are producing fentanyl in clandestine labs in Mexico with precursors from China.
Editor’s Note: Breitbart Texas traveled to Mexico City and the states of Tamaulipas, Coahuila, and Nuevo León to recruit citizen journalists willing to risk their lives and expose the cartels silencing their communities. The writers would face certain death at the hands of the various cartels that operate in those areas including the Gulf Cartel and Los Zetas if a pseudonym were not used. Breitbart Texas’ Cartel Chronicles are published in both English and their original Spanish. This article was written by “L.P. Contreras” from Mexico City and “C.P. Mireles” from Tamaulipas.