By Steve Neavling
CBP officers suspected right away that the soup cans they were inspecting didn’t contain a hearty broth.
While inspecting international express delivery parcels on Wednesday, CBP officers spotted a purple liquid leaking from 12 liter-sized cans labeled “Dutch Canned Vegetable Chicken Soup.”
Using an elemental isotope analysis tool, CBP officers learned that the contents of the cans were MDMA, which is synthetic ecstasy.
The MDMA, which was destined for Miami, weighed 24 pounds, 4 ounces.
“Crooked consumers continue to purchase dangerous drugs and controlled substances from unscrupulous international vendors, chemicals that consist of unverified ingredients that could potentially harm or kill our nation’s citizens,” Joseph Martella, CBP’s area port director in Philadelphia, said in a news release. “Customs and Border Protection officers remain steadfast in our commitment to searching through the proverbial haystack to intercept the needle of illicit shipments.”
On an average day in fiscal year 2021, CBP seized or disrupted 4,732 pounds of drugs in the U.S.
