Dubrovnik Police Seize 61.6 kg of Cocaine and 219.7 kg of Heroin in Two Operations

(Patria) - Police officers from the Criminal Police Service, Maritime Police Station, and Intervention Police Unit of the Dubrovnik-Neretva Police Administration, in cooperation with PNUSKOK of the Criminal Police Administration, ATJ Lučko police officers, Split Special Police Unit officers, relevant state prosecutor's offices, the Customs Administration in Zagreb and Rijeka, and the Mobile Unit Service of Dubrovnik Customs, have conducted two significant criminal investigations related to drug production, smuggling, and resale in the past few months.

On this occasion, a press conference was held today at the Dubrovnik-Neretva Police Administration where the results of the mentioned criminal investigations were presented by the Head of the Dubrovnik-Neretva Police Administration, Ivan Pavličević, the Head of the Drug Crime Service of PNUSKOK within the MUP Criminal Police Administration, Dražen Rastović, the Head of the Criminal Police Service of the Dubrovnik-Neretva Police Administration, Zoran Tikvica, and the Head of the Mobile Service Unit - Dubrovnik Customs, Pero Perić.
 
In these separate and unrelated criminal investigations, 61.6 kg of cocaine and 219.7 kg of heroin were seized.

Head Ivan Pavličević stated in his introduction that these criminal investigations are proof of the persistent and patient work of the police officers of this police administration, with excellent cooperation achieved with colleagues from Zagreb and Split, as well as with the Customs Administration, with whom we have been cooperating very successfully for years, which ultimately resulted in these truly impressive quantities of seized drugs, and which also continues a series of successful seizures of large quantities of drugs in the area of this police administration.

In the last 10 years, this police administration has had a total of 9,213 drug seizures, during which 767 kg of cocaine, 289 kg of heroin, and about 2.5 tons of marijuana were seized.

These criminal investigations involved the seizure of various types of drugs, and it is important to know that each drug has completely different modalities: from the place of production, method of storage, smuggling, and finally, sale, which means that this police administration has all the necessary capacities, in terms of knowledge and experience of police officers, without which such results would not be possible.

He once again emphasized the importance of the motivation of police officers who track down international drug smugglers and thus cut off their smuggling routes, thereby making not only Croatia safe, but also the surrounding countries and the European Union, which is the most common destination for cocaine and marijuana smuggling.

Finally, he thanked all collaborators in these criminal investigations and added that this is an indicator of very strong border control at sea and on land, as well as local street-level reduction.

Continuing the conference, Zoran Tikvica explained that these were unrelated criminal investigations that began based on high-quality operational information that was carefully analyzed and ultimately resulted in the seizures of cocaine and heroin.

The cocaine was found on November 3rd last year on a ship that sailed from South America into the Port of Ploče. It was a bulk carrier, and the cocaine was found by divers from ATJ Lučko, the Split Special Police Unit, the Intervention Police Unit, and the Maritime Police Station of this police administration, who found a metal box attached with magnets to the metal plating of the ship, at a depth of 16 meters, containing 3 packages of adhesive tape and foil with a total of 54 packages containing 61.6 kg of cocaine.

The criminal investigation did not establish that the captain or any of the ship's crew were involved in this smuggling, and this police administration has established international police cooperation with Western European countries, through which this criminal investigation continues.

In the second criminal investigation, based on a warrant from the County Court in Dubrovnik, heroin was found on October 11th last year in the Port of Ploče through the joint work of police officers from the Criminal Police Service of this police administration and customs officers from the Mobile Service Unit.

The search was initiated after an excellent profiling that resulted from a thorough risk analysis, and the search found 80 cast lead cubes, 40 of which contained heroin, with a total weight of 219.7 kg. The drugs were found in a shipping container for cargo transport that arrived in the Port of Ploče by ship from South America.

Dražen Rastović emphasized that in both cases, sophisticated smuggling methods were used that are very difficult to detect, and that this quantity of seized heroin, which was intended for the Western European market, is the largest in the Republic of Croatia. He also stressed that the strong southerly wind conditions were extremely unfavorable for finding the cocaine, which was hidden in a metal container attached with magnets to the underwater part of the ship's hull at a depth of 16 meters.