MEMPHIS, Tenn. — U.S. Customs and Border Protection said Friday the agency has seized more than 2,500 pounds of drugs in Memphis since the beginning of the fiscal year.
(Fiscal Year 2022 runs October 01, 2021 - September 30, 2022.)
In a news release Friday, the agency said its officers confiscated 2,509 pounds of drugs, including Fentanyl, heroin, cocaine, ketamine, DMT, marijuana, prescription opioids and steroids. They said most of the drugs coming into Memphis had been shipped from China, Mexico, and Brazil.
In January 2022 alone, the agency said it seized nearly 1,000 pounds of drugs, and the most frequently seized were Methamphetamine.
The agency said smugglers tried to hide the drugs in several different ways, including in shoes, ceramics, within the sides of cardboard boxes, in furniture, in sealed bags of tea, chips, soups, and baked into bread.
“Every shift, my officers and agriculture specialists are preventing shipments of dangerous narcotics, invasive pests and other contraband from reaching their recipients in your neighborhood,” said Michael Neipert, Memphis Area Port Director. “Sending narcotics via express consignment makes the carriers unwitting transporters. When fentanyl is shipped from Mexico to Massachusetts, you are putting everyone who handles it at risk: the pilots, drivers, sorters, all the way until it reaches the doorstep of the consignee, unless, of course, we find it first.”
CBP said it seized an average of 4,732 pounds of dangerous drugs every day across the United States last year.
