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July 25, 2008 9:58:57 PM CDT

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UK Beaches Awash in Cocaine

Posted Feb 28, 08 11:28 AM CST in World 

(Newser) – When a British beachcomber brought police a wheelbarrow full of 50 lbs. of pure Colombian cocaine the other day, Cornwall police weren’t stunned. In the last 3 weeks, five other such packages have washed up on Cornwall’s beaches, with a total street value of $1.2 million. “Luckily I’m one of the good guys,” said the upright citizen, “but you wonder how many of these packages” haven’t been reported.

The packages are all marked “Colombia,” so their origin isn’t a mystery, but how they wound up on UK beaches is. Based on the barnacles clinging to them, they may have drifted all the way across the Atlantic. “I think it’s the strong southwesterlies,” said another package-finder. “This cocaine has come a long way.” Police have stepped up patrols along the coast.

Source Guardian (UK)

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Barrels allegedly containing confiscated cocaine is displayed on a French military vessel in the port of Monrovia Liberia Friday Feb. 1, 2008. Packages of cocaine have been washing up almost regularly...   (Associated Press)
Devon and Cornwall police are working with Interpol to try to trace the origins of the drug and find out how the drugs are ending up on British beaches.   (Shutterstock.com)
Colombian police officers put away in plastic bags cocaine stones found in pieces of wood in this October, 2006 file photo taken in Bogota. Packages of Columbian cocaine have been washing up on UK shores,...   (Getty Images)
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