Investigators found more than half a ton of cocaine in banana crates in Franconia – some of the drug packages had even been delivered to a supermarket. “This is of course a huge find,” said a spokesman for the Bavarian State Criminal Police Office (BLKA) on Tuesday. Packages weighing one kilogram were hidden in numerous boxes, as the BLKA and the public prosecutor announced.
A total of more than 500 such packages were found. If the perpetrators had sold the drugs, they could have achieved a “wholesale price” of around 25 million euros, the spokesman said. The drugs would still be forensically examined. The first tests were positive for cocaine.
The first packages were noticed last Wednesday by employees in a central warehouse of a consumer market in the Bamberg district, who then called the police. “Obviously something went wrong with the perpetrators,” said the BLKA spokesman. “Otherwise they would have fetched it beforehand.” Experience has shown that perpetrators intercept the cargo directly at the port or in “ripening halls”.
Parts of the banana delivery have already been delivered to supermarkets throughout Franconia, the spokesman said. Most of the boxes contained bananas, but no drugs. The police found 17 of the packages in a Würzburg supermarket. It is still being determined where the cocaine came from.
In September 2017, large amounts of coke were discovered in Bavarian supermarkets. At that time, the trail could be traced back to Ecuador. The origin could be the same this time, said the BLKA spokesman. More details are still unclear, suspects have not yet been identified.