Raid police. (drawing) – AFP
About ten vehicles, 20 members of the Raid, investigators from Loire-Atlantique: during a week day and night, this extraordinary device allowed the interception of a “go fast” last Monday in the Somme and the seizure of close 60 kg of heroin, valued at nearly 2 million euros, we learned Friday from a police source. The investigation carried out by the Loire-Atlantique departmental security narcotics brigade began last January. It was a question of dismantling a network of heroin traffickers between the Netherlands in particular and Nantes, where the “head” of the traffic could be located and then arrested Wednesday in Morbihan after a chase.
In March, the Nantes investigators asked for the help of the Raid de Lille branch, which covered the Nord, Pas-de-Calais, Somme, Aisne and Ardennes, to intercept the “go fast” (vehicles transporting the drug, Editor’s note) of this network. “We are a transversal service and we have the means, a method in this kind of cases”, explains the commander of this branch. “We intervene in the last five percent of the police operation when the investigation service has carried out 95% of it”, he adds.
“He was stunned. “
After numerous investigations, studies of the routes taken by the criminals, it was decided that the interception would take place in the Somme, at the Jules-Verne toll in Amiens on the A29. “It was an extraordinary device,” says the head of the Lille Raid branch. During a week “continuously, day and night”, they hide. Until Pentecost Monday, when the “go fast” is drawn, and will be intercepted, in the middle of the afternoon, at the tollbooth. “There was no way for him to escape, unless he flew away,” continues the policeman.
No shots were fired, the thief alone on board did not attempt to cross the deployed harrow, nor to shoot at the heavily armed police officers. “He was stunned. Inside the vehicle, 20 kg of heroin in compressed packets is discovered. The same day, the Raid de Rennes branch carried out arrests in Nantes. 38 kg of powdered heroin will be seized during searches in Nantes. In total these nearly 60 kg of heroin represent, according to the police officer, 2 million euros for resale.
Five people will be arrested that Monday. The head of the network will finally be arrested, two days later, in Morbihan, at the end of an incredible hunt. According to Ouest-France, it would be a 35-year-old man. Friday, five suspects were to be referred to the Nantes prosecutor’s office.