Over 4 kg of heroin disguised as medicated oil seized

The agency said on Wednesday that it discovered heroin contained in 40 tubes of “medicated oil” that were meant to be sent to Australia.

The total weight of the heroin is 4.22 kilograms, which is valued at about VND15 billion (US$707,000).

On February 11, when examining a package declared as medicated oil in a customs declaration for non-commercial goods by an individual in District 4, customs officers discovered that 40 of the 140 tubes of oil in the package contained a suspicious paste.

Samples of the paste were sent to the Criminal Technical Department of the HCMC Police for testing, and the test results confirmed that the paste was heroin in solution form.

As shown on the customs declaration form, the consignee is Wendy Le, 24, whose address is 24 Carabeen St., Cabramatta, NSW 2166, Australia.

Repeat trick; same destination country

Putting heroin in medicated oil tubes to avoid detection is not a new trick; the same Express Delivery Customs Sub-department has detected many similar cases recently.

It is worth noting that in all cases, the receivers of the disguised goods reside in Australia. 

Most recently, on December 8, 2013, the Sub-department detected adrug precursor in several bottles of shampoo and hair dye en route by air to Australia sent by a person in southern Kien Giang Province.

On November 21, 2013, the agency seized a package of baby wipes, weighing 17 kg, after finding it contained Epherin, a drug precursor, in an unknown quantity. 

A day later, customs discovered a package of seaweed and belly fat melting cream containing 1.6 kg of Pseudoephedrin, another drug precursor.

Some days earlier, customs also detected 4 kg of Pseudoephedrin hidden in 20 cans of processed Tuyen Ky meat.