The country’s biggest drug trafficking gang has been hit on the double, with a second massive seizure of cocaine in just two days.
In total, Gardaí and Revenue have taken 76kgs of the drug as it entered the State in Wexford.
Today, Revenue intercepted 36kgs inside a freight unit that disembarked off a ferry in Rosslare Port coming from France.
Revenue said that seizure was the result of “risk profiling”, which are searches conducted on the basis of analysis typically examinations of certain routes and methods, rather than specific intelligence.
In its statement, Garda HQ said that gardaí arrested a man after Revenue officers seized the drugs.
The agencies put a final street value on the consignment at €2.5 million.
The day before, on Thursday, Gardaí and Revenue seized 30kgs of cocaine in Rosslare.
In statements from both agencies, it said that seizure was a joint operation involving the Garda National Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau (GNDOCB), Wexford Divisional Drugs Unit and Revenue’s Customs Service, suggesting it was based on intelligence.
The agencies gave that haul a final street value of €2.1m.
A west Dublin network, known as ‘The Family’, is behind the hauls. The gang is centred around a number of brothers from the Ballyfermot area, who live locally or in nearby Clondalkin.
This outfit was hit last month as part of an international operation involving the hacking of an encrypted phone system known as ‘Ghost’.
Gardaí conducted 27 searches in that operation, including the homes of three of the brothers, including the leader.
Some 100kgs of cocaine was seized in a hidden compartment of an articulated truck in Wexford and a total of 42 encrypted phones were seized along with a total €350,000 cash.
As part of that operation, Gardaí confirmed that this outfit had replaced the Kinahan crime cartel as the biggest drug trafficking gang in the country.
The gang, which has been in operation for almost three decades, was once the biggest heroin trafficking network in the country.
While it had links with the Kinahan cartel, when the latter dominated the cocaine and cannabis trade in Ireland, it was considered “independent” by security sources because of the scale of its operations and global contacts.
As a result of the Kinahan-Hutch feud, and the impact on the Kinahan cartel’s ability to operate, ‘The Family’ moved into the cocaine trade and made use of the considerable international contacts it had with European drug networks, Middle Eastern gangs and militant groups as well as Mexican cartels.
Gardaí and Revenue have been raising concerns in recent months at the scale of cocaine that is being imported, the bulk through the ports as well as a slice through airports.
