BP: Drug dog sniffs out $700K in marijuana stashed in flat-bed trailer
Border Patrol agents arrested a Phoenix man Friday after a drug dog alerted to narcotics, leading to the seizure of more than 1,400 pounds of marijuana, worth an estimated $700,000, concealed in a flat-bed trailer, authorities said.
The man, identified only as a 61-year-old man from Phoenix, was towing a trailer laden with excavating equipment with his Ford F-250 pickup when he drove through the Border Patrol checkpoint on State Route 85, just south of Gila Bend, about 114 miles northwest of Tucson.
An agent working the primary inspection lane referred the man to a secondary inspection area, where a drug dog alerted to the presence of narcotics in the trailer, said a spokesman with the Border Patrol's Tucson Sector.
Agents examined the trailer, and soon noticed bundles of narcotics hidden under the wood planks of the flatbed. After removing the excavating equipment, agents found and seized 64 bundles of marijuana, he said.
The driver was arrested for drug smuggling and handed over to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations, along with the marijuana, the spokesman said.
The truck, equipment and trailer were also seized, he said.