METHY SHRIMP

Drug shipment from Culiacan packaged with shrimp seized at Tijuana airport

Borderland Beat from AFN Tijuana
February 27, 2019

It is the nature of the city. The bodies appear with cartulinas, mensajaes, the drug loads cross, the drug loads appear in the local press, flanked by Policia Federal, or the SEDENA, or PEP, whomever. Yesterday the product was seized at the Tijuana airport. The dried shrimp boxes, originating from Culiacan, Sinaloa contained 922 kilograms of methamphetamine, 39 kilos of cocaine, and 10 kilograms of heroin.

The common poly drug load and the large amount of methamphetamine indicates one of the more prominent Sinaloa traffickers that work the Tijuana plaza. The cocaine would be certainly bound for the United States, broken into smaller loads, and trafficked into the US. The crystal, could be destined for retail sales in Tijuana, or trafficked into the US, possibly both.

The large amount of crystal is suggestive of a near secure route with the airport, despite the low cost of the drug, in Culiacan. The price in Tijuana would be around 1,000 a pound, jumping slightly in San Diego to roughly 1500-2000. Regardless, no one wants to lose nearly a ton of product, that was carefully produced, smuggled, and payoffs certainly made.

This method is commonly used, in Damaso Lopez Nunez's aka Mini Lic's 2016 indictment, federal court documents detailed several intercepted drug shipments, bound for Tijuana, from Sinaloa. Large amounts of crystal, packaged with seafood, and smaller amounts of cocaine and heroin were intercepted in 2015 and 2016. SEDENA with US intel seized the truck outside Los Mochis.

The defendants, including Lic's uncle, discussed the seizures, even sending links from Mexico based media outlets to each other, while being electronically surveilled by US authorities. These types of shipments have been common for years, as crystal began to be mass produced, and the price began to drop, significantly.

It is another day in Tijuana. Drugs in, drugs out. They fall. They cross. Money counted, washed, cleaned, spent, crossed, lost, seized, packaged. The bodies displayed across the city, the daily news mentions, washed away with the night, the blood on the concrete of Sanchez Tadoaba, and Camino Verde, the sunset enveloping the city, in the darkness, awaiting another day.