Narco-encomiendas: this is how the Chilean dealer who exported drugs to a transnational gang in Spain fell | bbcl_investigates | BioBioChile
When the Organized Crime and Anti-Drug Team of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria fell on them, the Spaniards each ran off on their own. Just moments ago they had headed to the commercial center of the city to receive a parcel from Chile.
The sender? Marco Navarrete Carreño, a dealer based in Quilicura, who sent the package by mail days before. At first glance, it did not bring more than typical Chilean handicrafts, magnets and 32 chess pieces. Decorations that actually hid drugs.
What neither he nor the Spaniards knew was that the PDI -as soon as the parcel appeared at the Santiago Airport- was already closely following the route, which allowed the fall of the Chilean and his Spanish accomplices.
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The alert was given by Chilean Customs personnel on the afternoon of that recent November 11. In their routine review, they noticed how an ocher-colored substance was hidden behind the chess pieces and the magnets.
They quickly notified the PDI. They adopted the rigorous procedure. The weigh-in? 854.5 grams of cocaine concentrate ready and willing to be dispatched.
The discovery gave way to action. Instead of just locating the sender, prosecutor Daniel Contreras (Western Metropolitan Prosecutor's Office) coordinated a controlled delivery of the package in Gran Canaria, Spain.
The package was dispatched and the recipients were led to believe that nothing had happened.
Undercover Chileans
Almost 10,000 kilometers from Santiago, in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, the Spanish Organized Crime and Anti-Drug Team took charge of monitoring the delivery. Three Chilean detectives also participated in an undercover mission.
Thus, the first thing was to intercept the telephone number that appeared as the shipping contact in the postal service. There appeared the name of a local, identified as Hamilton Flores Serna.
Other names emerged from that tapped phone: Jorge Marrero Sosa, considered by the investigative team to be the leader of the criminal group, and Yurena Díaz Velázquez, former partner of the latter.
Their relationship was later described by the Spanish police as "deeply emotional despite being legally separated."
The investigations would have their reward.
Better Europe than Chile
The encomiendas today stand as a new business model for drug traffickers. For bands that do not have access to high-tonnage shipments by sea, but do have contacts, the courier service appears as a not inconsiderable alternative.
As explained by the commissioner of the Airport Antinarcotics Brigade, Sergio Hurtubia Toro, the reason is simple: the economic returns are multiplied by 10 if the cocaine is sold in Europe.
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—The valuation of the drug within the informal market for a kilo here in Santiago de Chile is between 5 and 6 million pesos. But the possession of a kilo on the European continent... we are talking about 60 thousand euros (about 60 million Chilean pesos).
If the concentrate is cut or kicked, profits can double or even triple again.
Round business.
Follow-up by Quilicura
While cell phones were tapped in Europe, in Chile the civil police investigations continued. To locate the Chilean dealer, the PDI took the name of the sender of the parcel and entered it into their systems to find his address.
The result? A two-story house located in a double lane passage in Quilicura, Metropolitan region. The follow-ups began on November 18. Detectives stationed themselves outside the home and waited.
A man in a red shirt came out of the house and quickly got into his father's car. It was Marco Navarrete Carreño, the sender.
He boarded the vehicle and headed north of the passage. The detectives did the same. According to the judicial file, they followed him through seven points near his home in the same commune.
In all of them he "met with different subjects making movements attributable to the sale of drugs," reads the police report issued by the PDI after monitoring.
The latter, added to the encomienda, were sufficient reason to request a warrant to carry out his arrest.
The fall
It was just last December 15 when the proceedings in Spain gave results. That morning the police officers saw how Hamilton arrived at the post offices located in the Hoya de la Plata Shopping Center in Las Palmas.
While the recipient of the package was talking with the local workers, the detectives saw Yurena -the ex of the gang leader- wandering around the same mall.
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That, until the police stormed in. Yurena and Hamilton fled. They ran through the streets surrounding the mall.
It didn't take long for both of them to be arrested. The same fate befell Jorge, the head of the group and a fourth investigated.
Marco, his Chilean contact, would fall this Monday, January 3. In his house in Quilicura they found 428.2 grams of marijuana, 20 MDMA tablets, 4.9 granules also of the same drug, in addition to $350,000 Chilean pesos and a digital scale.
They were brought to justice.
joint work
Daniel Contreras, the persecutor of the Western Metropolitan Prosecutor's Office in charge of the investigations today values the joint work carried out with the Spanish authorities.
—It is an important step in the fight against international drug trafficking, which also strengthens communication (between the two countries).
Meanwhile, the director of Customs in the Metropolitan region, Rodrigo Díaz, highlights the work of his institution's officials in detecting the parcel.
—The efforts of Customs and its teams are focused not only on detecting drugs and other illicit drugs entering the country, but also on the exit of these products to other countries in a joint effort to protect the borders from drug trafficking.