Feds bust US$1b drug racket

Federal officials made a massive cocaine bust in Philadelphia, seizing an estimated 16.5 tons of the drug from a ship there — with a street value of over $1 billion.

The historic bust — the largest in the history of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania — comes amid a series of large seizures of the drug in the Northeast, including a record seizure of $18 million worth of the drug in March.

New York saw its largest cocaine bust in a quarter century in that months as well with $77 million worth of the drug seized from a cargo ship in the port of New York and New Jersey.

An official said the ship, the MSC Gayane, was headed from Chile to Europe when the drugs were found in Philadelphia at the Packer Marine Terminal. Members of the crew were charged, according to the local U.S. attorney’s office.

The drugs were concealed in seven shipping containers aboard the boat, which started its journey on May 31 and stopped in a number of places before landing in Philadelphia.

According to a senior Justice Department official, U.S. Customs and Border executed the seizure based on a joint investigation between the Department of Homeland Security and Drug Enforcement Administration.

Traffickers have been seeking out a new market for cocaine by mixing it with the powerful drug fentanyl, which is 50 times more potent than heroin and 100 times more potent than morphine. Synthetic opioids, like fentanyl have been responsible for thousands of overdose deaths a year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

A criminal complaint filed in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania named two defendants, Ivan Durasevic and Fonofaavae Tiasaga, the ship’s second mate and a crew member, respectively.

Cocaine’s resurgence was also linked to an overabundance of cocaine supply in Colombia, after the country stopped eradicating the coca plant.