The stock was intended to supply the Lyon and Saint-Etienne drug networks. More than 800 kg of cannabis was seized at the end of October and four suspects have been charged and are in pretrial detention, according to an interdepartmental announcement from the Rhône national police on Monday.
The latter was arrested on October 20 and 21 as part of a joint operation by police officers from the Lyon branch of the anti-narcotics office (Ofast) and officers from the Loire Organized and Specialized Crime Division (DCOS), it said in a press release.
Starting in the autumn of 2024, the investigation made it possible to trace three of them, the first of which was kept in the family home, near Lyon, “hundreds of kilos of cannabis resin” came from Spain, and the other two “actively participated in human trafficking in the Loire”, he added.
Moroccan Suitcase
The three men were later arrested by investigators who found from one of them “342 kg of cannabis resin, a gun”, as well as “109 rounds of ammunition and empty packaging” from a Moroccan suitcase (cardboard packages closed with adhesive), according to the same source.
(4/4) The murder of the Renault CEO: the bloody epic of the Action Directe group
Crime story tells major criminal cases every week.
A search of a box in the Loire also led to the discovery of “478 kg of cannabis” contained in “nine Moroccan suitcases” and six large storage bags as well as a “stolen vehicle”. Around 17,000 euros in cash was also seized from the apartment of one of the three suspects.
The day after this operation, the fourth suspect, a human trafficker from Saint-Etienne linked to human trafficking, was arrested at his home, the police found in his and his mother’s house “two assault rifles, two pistols, about a hundred rounds of ammunition” and a “bulletproof vest”, concluded the press release.
