Agents with the U.S. Customs and Border Protection recovered almost 900,000 fentanyl pills last week at an entry port in California. The pills carried an estimated street value of $2.5 million.
The U.S. Customs and Border Protection shared the news in a press release, noting that officers at the Otay Mesa port in San Diego county stopped a 45-year-old Mexican national, who is believed to have been smuggling the drugs.
The man allegedly “presented a valid border crossing card and a shipping manifest for two porcelain sinks.”
Officials began searching the man’s vehicle after an initial inspection revealed “anomalies within the shipment.”
It was then that officials found roughly 858,000 blue pills concealed in 12 packages inside the sinks, the agency shared.
The 190 pounds of fentanyl was seized, and the driver was turned over to Homeland Security Investigations.
The Otay Mesa port is one of the busiest commercial ports in California. This isn’t the first time that narcotics have been seized at the border, as the CBP shared that nearly 20,000 pounds of fentanyl has been seized so far this year.
“Narcotics traffickers will try new and innovative ways to smuggle dangerous drugs across our borders, but CBP officers are always on their toes,” Port Director Rosa Hernandez said in the statement.
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