“Report of a person who makes drugs like crystal at home.”
This is how an anonymous email begins that on March 13, 2021 arrived at the anti-drug mailbox of the National Police.
This is one of the dozens of messages of this type that they receive every week and that they review one by one.
In this case, it seemed to the researchers that the thread could be pulled.
The informant gave details of an address in Texas (United States).
"I am very afraid because many trucks pass by my house, I am afraid for my daughters, they also have many weapons," the email continued.
Finally, he gave a first name and two last names.
Thus began a collaboration between Spanish investigators and those of the US drug office, the DEA for its acronym in English.
The scared neighbor was right:
Police estimate that in the last six months they have reviewed 4,000 emails like this.
Of these, only 5% contain relevant information and lead to the resolution of cases, although the National Police's narcotics brigade reads them all and derives or assumes the information, as appropriate.
Its members especially remember this matter because the dismantling of a laboratory in the United States was an exceptional case, although it was not the first notice from abroad that they received.
"Sometimes we receive complaints from Latin American citizens because of the language or because they trust us, but usually they refer to Spanish territory," explains J., the group's inspector.
"It is satisfying to think of that neighbor watching the police operation and knowing that his email was read and it ended like this," sums up the police officer.
In that case, the communication began and ended with that first message, but sometimes the exchange continues.
The agents can intuit who the complainant is, but they never request more personal data.
"Subject: Marijuana", began another email that reached the group on September 23, 2021 sent to antidroga@policia.es.
This sender detailed in great detail the ins and outs of a drug trafficking network that operated in Lleida.
He not only indicated the address where a marijuana plantation was located, but also specified that "to access it, you have to enter through the neighboring building, which is all a parking
space
”, that “there is a metal door on the second floor” and that the main door was “walled up from the inside”.
He went on to explain that the drugs came from Romania, what vehicles they used, the hours, the place of distribution, by what means the criminals communicated and that the drugs were hidden in "sausages, cheeses or toys".
In another of the messages he claimed to have "nothing to do with these people."
He was not wrong in any detail.
Shortly after, the organization was arrested first thing in the morning, while they were still sleeping, at the two addresses they used for their criminal activity.
Even the number of plants that the informant had provided was exact: 200 in one of the houses and 1,600 in the other house.
Fragments of three of the anonymous emails sent by citizens to the anti-drug mail of the National Police.
These watchful eyes are very useful in rural areas, because drug traffickers tend to select remote places to set up their laboratories.
This was what happened with an operation carried out in a town in Toledo.
"Good afternoon, I am a farmer from [the town we omitted to protect the complainant] and I wanted to tell you that recently I have been seeing strange things on a farm near my land (...) I have seen how they put in one of the warehouses many white and blue carafes.
I don't want to say any of my information out of fear, but please stop by.
I have spoken with people from the town and we are very concerned ”, read the message he left on the form on the Police website.
"From that message begins a series of surveillance from a long distance to observe the entrances and exits of the farm," explains inspector A.
“You have to be watching for many hours to use that key moment when you see them go out to smoke a cigarette or detect when the drug is possibly entering the laboratory.
It's many hours of
cheetos
inside the car”, comments the inspector.
A work between craft and new technologies, which has been developed for 56 years in the Central Narcotics Brigade.
The cooks, as they call those in charge of treating narcotics for sale to distributors, barely leave the farms or chalets where they set up their laboratories.
One of the key moments is observed when criminals throw liquid from a bucket onto the ground.
"They are what we call dirty water, all the waste left by the drug treatment and that contaminates a lot, it is pure poison," stresses Inspector A. All these observations are clues that are weighing on the evidence to end these organizations , and that these agents easily detect thanks to hours and hours of experience looking at farms in which, with the naked eye,
Months after monitoring, the agents entered that farm where the farmer had observed "strange things."
Bingo!
The rooms were full of bottles with chemical substances prepared for the treatment of the drug and even part of it boiling.
"Let me turn it off while you search, otherwise we'll all explode," one of the detainees asked.
There, among beautiful tiles, mattresses on the floor and hundreds of drums, lived the Colombian cooks who had settled in the town a few months before.
In the kitchen, part of the drug was mixed with freshly bought bread from the village and a bottle of ketchup.
TV shows also help turn citizens into potential police officers.
In another of the messages, from November 20, 2018, another citizen writes: "I have seen strange things, movement of people coming in and out with blue and white bottles like the ones that appear in the Investigation Team
programs
”.
This informant adds some very specific details of the house where this happens.
"The thing about the carafes always makes our alarms go off, because they are the ones that contain the chemical elements to treat the drug," the inspector details.
The drug never arrives in bundles in a suitcase, like in the movies, but is impregnated in different materials, such as concrete or clay.
Only cooks know the processes and the exact measures to extract the narcotic substance.
They almost always bring them from their places of origin, remain in Spain for a few months and leave when they have finished their work.
Many of them are old acquaintances of the police.
Citizen tips make the eyes of the police multiply.
No one better than a neighbor detects "weird things" and white and blue bottles that should not be there.
If they write down their suspicions and press "send" they may see a live police deployment a few months later.
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