By Kevin Deutsch
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Authorities in the Bronx this week discovered more than $10 million worth of cocaine apparently smuggled into Hunts Point on a produce truck, officials said.
DEA agents conducting a surveillance operation, along with a Port Authority K-9 unit, uncovered the hidden shipment of seventy heat-sealed bricks of cocaine on Wednesday, officials said.
The drugs were initially smuggled into a Longfellow Avenue warehouse, brought there on board a truck that carried papayas, coconuts, and other produce, officials said. The location is near the popular Hunts point food markets, through which thousands of trucks pass each day.
“This investigation uncovered a commercial warehouse close to the busy Hunts Point markets that served as a front for international narcotics importation,” said Special Narcotics Prosecutor Bridget G. Brennan, whose office is prosecuting the case. “The sheer amount of cocaine seized in one week reflects the magnitude of this drug operation.”
The driver caught transporting the drugs, Miguel Marte-Veras, 31, was arrested on charges of operating as a major trafficker and criminal possession of a controlled substance, according to prosecutors. An attorney for Marte-Veras could not immediately be reached for comment.