Police bust Pokemon drug operation with art cases used to traffic cocaine
You never expect to find cocaine in Pokemon art cases, but that is exactly what police found.
You'd think that Pokemon and cocaine are about as polar opposite as you can get, and you'd never put the pair together in the same sentence.
Well, you say that, but some drug traffickers couldn't help but combine the two in a rather bizarre and perhaps unbelievable operation.
Two men from Bedford in the US were arrested on Tuesday (6 June) after a joint effort from the United States Postal Service inspector and New Bedford police coordinated a controlled delivery of the package to an apartment at the nearby Viall Street.
The way they did it started through an undercover postal inspector posing as a mail carrier, who then brought the package to the door.
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Just moments after that, 20-year-old Darren Casado Ruiz grabbed the package and sprinted through the backyard to Salisbury Street.
He was then seen getting into a red Jeep Renegade driven by 19-year-old Angel Rodriguez, with police managing to stop them and arrest the pair.
Following the duos arrest, local authorities got a search warrant going and opened the drugs package.
But what they were rather surprised to find were two plastic Pokemon art cases sealed with plastic.
And while usually you'd find something nice for the kids to enjoy in these cases, police in fact found two kilograms of cocaine - truly ruining the legacy of the great that is Pikachu.
Ruiz and Rodriguez were charged with trafficking in excess of 200 grams of cocaine and conspiracy to violate the drug law.
The charge is a big win for local officials as investigators say five other similar packages had been sent to that particular department during the last two months.
District Attorney Quinn said: "I’m very pleased that this investigation led to the seizure of a significant amount of cocaine. I would like to thank the various agencies for their cooperative effort, which resulted in these arrests."
Surprisingly, this is not the first time cocaine and Pokemon has gone hand-in-hand - yeah, I know.
Earlier this year, it was revealed a man who had been wanted by the police for a year over a well organised drug gang actually had an obsession with Pokemon Go.
While he was convicted for his crimes, Raymond Phipps' barrister Ioana Nedelcu noted that most of the movements police tracked actually involved Phipps playing Pokemon Go.
The popular mobile game allows players to use their phone camera to scan the real world and find Pokemon, which pop up virtually and can be collected.
Callum Jones