Another pot bust on I-40
Nearly a ton recovered at port of entry

50 bundles of marijuana weighing 1,719 lbs. were recovered at the Gallup Port of Entry, Thursday. Courtesy photo

Copyright © 2009
Gallup Independent
By Phil Stake
Staff writer

GALLUP — Motor Transportation Police at the Port of Entry west of Gallup recovered $2 million worth of marijuana Thursday from a flat-bed commercial truck.

The driver, a 39-year-old Winter Haven, Fla., man, whose name was not released, has been turned over to the Drug Enforcement Administration in Albuquerque, according to New Mexico Department of Public Safety Communications Director Peter Olson.

Olson said in a news release Friday that, during a routine inspection, a discrepancy in the driver’s paperwork prompted police to search his cargo — which consisted of aluminum building materials and three wooden crates. Inside the crates were 50 tightly-packed, cellophane-wrapped bundles of pot totaling 1,719 pounds when weighed together. The pot was bound for the east coast, according to Olson.

Reporter Phil Stake can be reached at philip.stake@gmail.com, or by calling (505) 863-6811 x223.