New Generation of 'Entrepreneurs' Move Illegal Drugs Easily Through Security at Airports Enrique Alvarado, Andres M. Estrada and Alejandro - El Universal
go to original February 3, 2015

Experts in the field agree that the new generation of "small dealers" is comprised of graduates, professionals and even entrepreneurs who carry small amounts of drugs, and therefore move easily through security at airports. (Leticia Barradas)

Illegal drugs couriers are no longer Central American, Colombian or Mexican, but also Romanian, Spanish, Italian and even Asians traveling as middle class or upper class tourists.

If we could see the faces of all those arrested at Mexico City International Airport for drug possession in the last 10 years, we would realize that the profile of illegal drugs couriers, or "mules", has changed.

In 2008 members of the Federal Police (PF) detected a half kilo (1.1 pounds) of cocaine attached to the abdomen of Lo Sasso Carmine, a 39-year-old Italian that sought to reach Naples, Italy along with Robert Warren, an American citizen. Three years later another mule, Charonitis Zacharias, intended to take half kilo of cocaine to Greece hidden in a suitcase. Last year two Japanese citizens were arrested with 220 tablets of methamphetamine.

Federal Police data obtained via transparency showed that from 2006 to 2014, 259 people were arrested at Mexico City airport on drug possession charges. However, a newsletter issued in 2011 by the same agency reported 700 arrests for the same crime in that year only.  

Mules are no longer Central American, Colombian or Mexican, but also Romanian, Spanish, Italian and even Asians traveling as middle class or upper class tourists. They are called "freelance" mules.

Read the rest at El Universal

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