TIRANA, May 1 – Spanish police seized one ton of cocaine and €1.55 million in cash from an allegedly Albanian-led criminal gang accused of transporting big amounts of Colombian cocaine by charter planes and used local criminal gangs to distribute it.
Spanish media published the arrested Albanians’ names shortly after the operation. According to La Razon, Julian Deblini and Dritan Gradica were in charge of the gang, while Spanish citizens Ruben Paz Ciprian Munoz and Ruben de Castillo de la Torre handled distribution and logistics.
The operation was assisted by the US Drug Enforcement Administration and the Colombian anti-narcotics department and overseen by EUROPOL.
According to local media reports, the narcotics would fly overseas inside black sacks, hidden under the services of a transportation company. The investigation, ongoing since last October, resulted in the arrest of the five suspects.
The fifth was the man in charge of transporting the drugs from Colombia, named Lelio Nevarda Avila Santana.
Police verifications uncovered that Albanians led the traffic ring from Spain, where they had moved aiming to establish an entry point for drugs into Europe.
It was in this context the police managed to localize and confiscate a previously transported amount of drugs that had been stored in Madrid, where it would later be distributed.
The 790 packages of cocaine and amount of cash were found in the charter sacks and were followed by the arrest of the two Albanians — head of the traffic ring and his right hand — who local media also alleged have had previous military training, referring to police reports.
