On 25th June 2020, U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers stopped a Canadian trucker from entering the United States. They questioned the man and checked the tractor-trailer manifest. It noted the presence of many storage bins in its capacity. Upon more intensive X-ray screening, there were noticeable anomalies in the content.
Then, the officers forced the wooden pallet box open and came across pounds of marijuana, sealed in vacuumed bags. In fact, according to the CBP officials, the total weight of this seized marijuana was around 9,472 pounds. In recorded history, this is the largest marijuana seizure at the northern US-Canada border.
The entire incident occurred in the Peace Bridge and is not the only recorded case of this magnitude this year.
Updates on marijuana seizure cases in the US-Canada border
Over this year, CBP officials have caught millions of dollars worth of marijuana shipments over the Canada-New York border crossing. The Buffalo Field Office of CBP captured 42,015 pounds weight of narcotics in their fiscal year of October 1 to September 30. They cover 16 of the entry ports to the United States.
The increased percentage since the last fiscal year is around 968% in this case. Out of the total amount captured, the number of marijuana drugs last fiscal year was 3,456.18 pounds. This fiscal year, this count of marijuana is 41,687.76 pounds in total.
Around two weeks prior to this, CBP officials caught a truck carrying over a ton weight of marijuana over the Peace Bridge. Similarly, CBP officers caught another trucker carrying around two tons of marijuana in early August. This tally is not limited to Peace Bridge alone. Indeed, CBP officials have caught a trucker carrying 1,600 pounds of marijuana last August at the Lewiston-Queenston Bridge. A few weeks after this, they stopped another truck at this bridge, this time with around 3,500 pounds of this drug. To fool officials, the bags were marked as zinc oxide.
According to the CBP Buffalo Office Director of Field Operations, Rose Murphy, there are some reasons for this marijuana smuggling rise. For one thing, the price of this drug in the United States is much higher than before. This occurred due to the shutdown of nonessential travel from Mexico and Canada during the pandemic since March 21. Plus, growing marijuana is legal in Canada and many cannabis growers in Canada have legal permits to grow extra. Then, they sell it more in the United States for profit. As a result of this, the price of marijuana on the streets is much higher this year. Many local law-enforcement professionals agree with this statement.
