Sydney woman busted with $36.7mn worth of meth at airport

A woman in Australia was arrested trying to smuggle nearly 40kg of methamphetamine. The 32-year-old was coming to Sydney from South Africa and was carrying two suitcases. Border Force officers grew suspicious of their contents and did a search. They found meth worth around $36.7 million in her two suitcases. In the first suitcase, she was carrying 20kg of white powder in vacuum-sealed bags, while in the second suitcase, officers found 19kg of it. The powder was tested, and the results showed that it was methamphetamine, a total of 39 kgs. The Australian Federal Police (AFP) took her into custody, Nine News reported. She has been charged with one count of importing a commercial quantity of a border-controlled drug and one count of possessing a commercial quantity of a border-controlled drug. She faces life imprisonment for the crime.

The officers at the airport grew suspicious as the X-ray of her bags allegedly identified anomalies in both suitcases. “This amount of methamphetamine, had it reached the Australian community, had an estimated street value of about $36.7 million, with the potential for about 390,000 street-level deals,” Australian Federal Police said in a statement. In the past few months, several drug busts have been made in Australia. Reports say that seven people have been charged and more than 100kg of illicit substances have been seized at the border. AFP Detective Superintendent Morgen Blunden said, “We have disrupted these criminal supply chains, and these arrests should serve as a warning to criminal syndicates attempting to import harmful drugs into our country – we are ready and waiting, and you will be caught.”

Drug busts in Australia

On 22 January, Australian Border Force officers at Sydney Airport intercepted two passengers - a Briton and a Dutch. They were acting erratically in the arrivals hall. Hospital scans revealed that latex-wrapped pellets contained cocaine inside their bodies. Each of them had ingested 106 such pellets.