‘Traffickers, syndicates own land, houses, cars’

Police seized RM81.7 million worth of properties and cars from local and foreign drug traffickers between January and last month.

KUALA LUMPUR: Federal Narcotics CID director Noor Rashid Ibrahim said the seizures comprised properties and cars confiscated by the long arm of the law in 7,844 cases of drug trafficking nationwide.

He said yesterday,  the seizure was an increase of 66 per cent in the value of goods as compared to the goods worth about RM49.29 million, which were seized last year.

He said this year’s seizures involved among others, houses, cars, land and valuables, believed to have been obtained through proceeds from the sale of drugs.

“About 10 percent of the total seizure is from foreign drug syndicates,” he added.

Noor Rashid said police had, on Nov 18, uncovered a syndicate which was previously headed by a Nigerian who handed over the reins to his local wife to continue the drug ‘business’.

He said investigations revealed that the Nigerian was the mastermind behind the smuggling of drugs into the country while his 32-year-old wife played the role of sourcing for drug mules.

“The police uncovered the couple’s activities during a raid and arrested three local women and a Nigerian man at a hotel in Jalan Ipoh on Monday, just before midnight.

“They were unloading two boxes containing 160 units of mobile phone battery chargers which had the party drug, syabu, hidden within. The drug weighed 3.4kg and was worth about RM510,000,” he said.

Noor Rashid said the case was among the top five successful drug smuggling cases to be crippled by the police within four days, beginning Nov 15, involving drug consignments worth a total of about RM1.8 million.

-Bernama