Border Patrol Agents Find $43,000 Worth of Cocaine Washed Up on Florida Coastline

Packages containing nearly 1,533 pounds of cocaine seized by U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers in a tractor-trailer at Colombia-Solidarity Bridge in Laredo, Texas, on Aug. 26, 2022. U.S. Customs and Border Protection

U.S. Border Patrol agents in Florida discovered 3 pounds of cocaine that had washed up near the coastline of Cape Canaveral on Thursday.

Officials said they found the drugs, which have an estimated street value of $43,000, inside a water-logged package that had washed up on the shore, Fox News reported. The drugs will now be processed for seizure, officials said.

The Epoch Times has contacted U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) for comment.

This is not the first time drugs have washed up on Florida’s coastline.

On Oct. 15, Chief Patrol Agent Walter N. Slosar, who leads the agency’s Miami Sector, said on Twitter that a good Samaritan walking in Daytona Beach had discovered a suspicious-looking package washed up along the shoreline.

Upon opening the package, officers discovered it contained nearly 11 pounds of cocaine with a street value of over $150,000.

Elsewhere, Department of Homeland Security agents are still investigating 50 packages of cocaine worth an estimated $1.7 million that washed up on Vero Beach, Florida, on Oct. 7.

Major Drug Seizures in Recent Days

The day before the cocaine was discovered in Florida, border officers in California seized more than 2 tons of hard narcotics over a two-day period, including packages of methamphetamine that had been concealed inside a shipment of onions, officials said Wednesday.

The first seizure occurred at about 1:30 p.m. on Oct. 20, when border officers from the Otay Mesa Commercial Facility inspected the tractor-trailer of a 28-year-old man who claimed his vehicle contained a shipment of green onions.

Upon further examination of the vehicle, officers found a package disguised as onion chives that had been “concealed deep in the middle of the pallet of the green onions.” Officers searched the shipment and detained 183 packages containing methamphetamine hidden within the shipment of green onions.

In total, officers seized approximately 1,529 pounds of methamphetamine with an estimated street value of $3.3 million.

The following day at about 10:53 a.m. officers came across a 29-year-old man driving a tractor-trailer, who said he was transporting a shipment of electronics.

Officers said they discovered “anomalies in the trailer” and a K-9 team was bought in to screen the truck and trailer where they later found 195 packages of methamphetamine and 75 packages of cocaine concealed within a false wall in the vehicle.

In total, CBP officers seized about 1,993 pounds of methamphetamine and 1,037 pounds of cocaine, which they estimate has a street value of $20.8 million.

The total estimated street value for both seizures is $24.2 million, officials said.

“CBP officers are the front-line of stopping these dangerous drugs from entering the U.S.,” said Jennifer De La O, CBP director of field operations for the San Diego Field Office, in a statement. “The lengths drug trafficking organizations are willing to go to conceal and smuggle narcotics is a testament to how effective our officers are.”