Officers from the Australian Border Force (ABF) discovered the drugs on July 22, 2022, during an inspection of shipping containers on the container ship Maersk Inverness, which had docked the day before. The haul was discovered in denim bags inside a shipping container labelled “wood products.”
AFP investigators later discovered 28 denim bags, each containing approximately 25kg of cocaine in brick form. A forensic examination of the drugs revealed various emblems on the cocaine bricks, including the numerals ‘5’ and ‘365,’ as well as the word ‘Netflix.
Preliminary investigations on the ship have been completed, and the ship is now free to continue its journey.
Anyone with information is urged to contact Crime Stoppers at 1800 333 000.
AFP Detective Inspector Luke Wilson stated that the container ship had made stops in Central and South America before arriving in Australia.
“We’re still looking into where the drugs were loaded and who planned to collect them in Australia,” said Det-Inspector Luke Wilson.
“The seizure of this amount of drugs would be a significant blow to a well-resourced syndicate, preventing millions of dollars in drug profit from flowing back into the syndicate to fund their lavish lifestyles or next criminal venture.”
According to the AFP, this seizure saved the community more than $451 million in drug-related harm, including crime, healthcare, and lost productivity.
Superintendent Joanne Yeats of ABF Detained Goods NSW described the ABF’s role in disrupting the criminal network’s supply of drugs into our community.
“This seizure exemplifies the technical expertise of our dedicated ABF officers who made the initial detection and prevented this large shipment of cocaine from entering our community,” said Superintendent Yeats.
We will continue to work with our law enforcement partners to keep the Australian community safe from dangerous drug importation.
Depending on availability and purity, purchasers on Australia’s east coast can pay up to $400,000 for a kilogramme of cocaine, with this amount of cocaine representing at least $280 million dollars.
