Walter Finch
A HUGE police operation to smash the narco-trafficking gangs plaguing the Strait of Gibraltar swept up a €1.4 million in cold hard cash.
Dubbed Grajuela, the joint operation was launched after the intentional killing of two Guardia Civil officers by known narco traffickers in Barbate, Cadiz, two months ago.
It nabbed 31 suspected traffickers, 4000 kilos of hashish and 627 kilos of cocaine, as well as 19 high-end cars.
However, most astonishing for law enforcement officials is the amount of hard currency that was discovered in a safe in Chiclana, just south of Cadiz.
The officers raided the house of a car rental businessman known only as JC in the picturesque seaside town of Sancti Petri and immediately went to the safe.
Once opened, they discovered hundreds of wages of notes bundled together. It is one of the largest cash hauls in the very significant history of narco trafficking busts in Cadiz and Spain.
Though the operation ran from a luxury urbanisation in Lisbon, it had a wide network of collaborators and infrastructure throughout the Sanlucar de Barrameda area of Cadiz, where the leaders originated from.
The organisation had between eight and ten high-performance boats alongside a network of smaller boats used to provide necessary items like food and petrol to the big boats.
The investigation began last May, when agents detected the gang picking up 6,000 kilos of cocaine from a submarine coming from South America.
Although the boat sank due to mechanical issues, it prompted the police investigation, locating the leaders in the Cadiz areas of Sanlucar de Barrameda, Chipiona and El Cuervo.
Later, police found the director of the gang’s naval operations hiding out from Spanish authorities in Lisbon.
The well-established drug trafficker controlled the criminal drug network with the highest communication technology, allowing them to track the movement of security forces in the Gibraltar Strait.
Each time drugs were moved, gang leaders would travel to Spain to coordinate the operation.
