Swiss police have seized over 500 kilograms of cocaine at a Nespresso factory in the town of Romont. Preliminary investigations show that the shipment, which was concealed within five shipping containers of coffee products, appears to have come from Brazil.
According to the Fribourg cantonal police, the authorities were contacted immediately when workers discovered the illicit shipment and as a result, fortunately none of the coffee products were contaminated. The shipment ended up totalling more than 500 kilograms, making it the second-largest cocaine haul in Swiss police history.
The largest discovery was made at an airport in 2019, when suitcases offloaded from a private jet were found to contain more than 600 kilograms of cocaine. The crew of the private flight, which travelled from Uruguay to Basel-Mulhouse-Freiburg airport in Basel via Nice, were found to be complicit in the smuggling.
According to a report by the European Union’s law enforcement agency Europol and the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction, cocaine availability in Europe “is probably at an all-time high.” The European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction found that in 2020, the EU cocaine retail market was worth around 11 billion Swiss francs.
The cocaine discovered at the Nespresso factory, which upon testing was found to be over 80 percent pure, has an estimated street value of 50 million Swiss francs. Investigators believe the shipment made its way to the factory after being flown into a Swiss airport from Brazil and then being transferred to a train. The Office of the Attorney General of Canton Fribourg, where the factory is located, has opened an official investigation to find out more.