CHICAGO (AP):
FEDERAL OFFICIALS charged 35 people in an international scheme to smuggle drugs inside cans of baby formula, and said some of the smugglers rented infants from their parents so that customs agents would not get suspicious.
U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald announced three indictments yesterday, alleging Chicago-based conspiracies in which cocaine and heroin were smuggled into the United States from Panama and Jamaica for distribution in Chicago, New York and Britain between 1996 and 1999.
"Renting babies for the purpose of allowing drug dealers to smuggle cocaine and heroin is truly a new low in drug smuggling," Fitzgerald said, adding that one infant took six trips - the first at 3 weeks old.
Those charged included alleged suppliers in Panama and Jamaica, nine organisers, couriers and four Chicago parents, authorities said.
At least 34 smuggling trips involved female couriers who used 20 infants, Fitzgerald said. The women would travel from Chicago to Panama carrying infants, either their own or infants provided to them for the trip.
In Panama, some of the women would be given baby formula cans that contained liquid cocaine. Others would insert heroin into their bodies. Then they would return to the United States with the drugs.
