The Guardia Civil in Ibiza has exhibited the cache of synthetic drugs seized in ‘Operation Adriatic’, including one million ecstasy pills, the largest seizure of this drug in the history of Spain, according to the head colonel of the Guardia Civil in the Balearics, Alejandro Hernández.
Hernández explained to the press that the operation by the Anti-Drug Organised Crime Team (DOA) of the Guardia Civil of the Balearics, in collaboration with the Ibiza company and with the help of the Italian police, has been “successful” and a “complicated and difficult” investigation as it “straddles different islands and different countries”.
The exploitation phase was carried out on 5 September with ten searches, eight in different areas of Ibiza and two in Benalmádena (Malaga), resulting in nine arrests, “five of Italian nationality, one Dutch and three Spanish”, Hernández said.
In addition to the million ecstasy pills (1,071,327 pills), weighing 357 kilograms, 212 kilos of ketamine, 73 kilos of MDMA, 20 kilos of cocaine, 21 kilos of pink cocaine (tusi), 10 kilos of hashish and 6 kilos of marijuana, as well as 3 kilos of ‘sugar’, a substance for making pink cocaine, totalling 700 kilos of drugs, have also been seized.
The Guardia Civil estimates that the value of the seized drugs could exceed 25 million euros. The entire stash was found in the searches in Ibiza, in one of the homes searched and in the double-bottomed vehicles used by the organisation to bring the drugs onto the island, which were located in some of the properties searched.
Hernández also specified that those arrested belonged to an international criminal network led by Italian nationals based in Ibiza, who were helped by Spanish and Dutch nationals. The colonel added that the three Spaniards arrested are also from the island and that the one arrested in Malaga is an Italian woman.
The investigation began between the end of April and the beginning of May when the agents detected, as a result of the latest operations carried out, the existence of an organisation that was smuggling drugs into Ibiza, using mules who drove vehicles with double bottoms from the Netherlands.
For this reason, at the Spanish-French border of Irun, the agents stopped a vehicle “that had made a sufficiently suspicious journey coming from Holland” and discovered a double bottom with 25 kilograms of different synthetic drugs inside, such as MDMA, ketamine and ecstasy.
In the course of the investigation, the agents were able to ascertain that part of the organisation had moved to Malaga to settle in that area and extend the business in this province. After identifying the main members of the network, the searches and arrests were made. The nine detainees have been handed over to the Juzgado de Instrucción number 3 of Palma and seven of them have been sent to prison while the others have been released on bail, the only ones who had this possibility.
The chief colonel hoped that the detainees would be “convicted” and that it would not happen again like the last big operation in Ibiza in 2022, Dragon Ball, in which they also seized 18 kg of methamphetamines, to make 870,000 ecstasy pills, as well as other drugs, and in which several of the detainees were later released due to an error in the judicial procedure.
“I hope that this time it doesn’t happen and that in a year’s time, if we have other successes, we will be able to say that they have been brought before the courts, that they have been sent to prison and that they have been convicted because of the evidence we have behind us”, said Hernández in reference to the drugs seized.
Operation Adriatic, which is still open and in which new arrests are not ruled out, is part of Operation High Impact Zulu Bravo, carried out this summer in Ibiza, in which some 30,000 people have been identified, some 14,000 vehicles have been controlled, more than 1,000 reports have been made for different reasons and 127 people have been arrested.