International operation in Lithuania uncovers secret conversations and bizarre cover stories

The car was just 60 metres from Lithuania’s border when border guards stopped it during a night patrol in the village of Škilinpamūšis, Pasvalys district. Inside the Audi A6, they found drugs. A search also revealed that the passenger, who presented himself as a businessman, had strapped a belt containing narcotics to his body.

The passenger had told officers that he was a tourist who had flown to Bogotá and planned to travel from Vilnius to Hamburg. Investigators later determined that his actual destination was Kutaisi in Georgia. The drugs were allegedly being moved as part of an international trafficking operation, with narcotics originating in Colombia.

Prosecutors said the luggage in the car contained almost half a kilogram of cannabis. The passenger carried nearly 100 grams of cocaine in a special belt. Investigators also concluded that he had agreed to act as a drug courier, or “mule,” and had previously been expected to swallow packages containing narcotics. The source said he referred to those packages as “meatballs” and “candies.”

Both Latvian citizens faced criminal charges for possessing a large quantity of drugs with the intent to distribute them and for carrying the substances across Lithuania’s state border without presenting them for customs control. The passenger denied knowing that the luggage contained drugs and challenged his eight-year-and-three-month sentence.

The Lithuanian Court of Appeal rejected that argument. A three-judge panel led by Judge Eglė Gruodienė said the evidence showed that the driver knew he had to collect the suitcase and take it, together with the passenger, to Vilnius Airport. The court also found that the passenger knew the car was carrying drugs destined for Kutaisi, where they were to be distributed.

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I am a businessman. I flew to Bogotá, Colombia, as a tourist, and then planned to travel from Vilnius to Hamburg, Germany. What happened is a major misunderstanding.