A drug sniffing dog was apparently responsible for a steroid bust at the Mexican border in El Paso on December 12, 2008. A United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officer stopped a 2002 Chevrolet Trailblazer at the primary border inspection booth on the Paso del Norte Bridge in El Paso after the driver appeared unusually nervous. A drug sniffing dog named “Shadow” detected steroids carefully concealed inside the dashboard of the Trailblazer during a secondary inspection. Juan Carlos Castillo was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) special agents and held without bond in the El Paso County Jail for attempting to smuggle 150 vials of anabolic steroids into the United States (”Steroids in dashboard and pot in fuel tanks busted by agents,” December 15).
The steroid seizure was made early Friday evening when a 2002 Chevrolet Trailblazer entered the downtown Paso Del Norte international crossing from Mexico. A CBP officer at the primary inspection booth noticed that the driver was nervous during a routine interview so the vehicle was selected for a secondary exam. During the secondary inspection, CBP drug sniffing dog “Shadow” alerted to the dashboard of the vehicle. CBP officers continued their exam and discovered bundles of anabolic steroids concealed in the dashboard. CBP officers removed a total of 150 vials of steroids from the dashboard compartment.
The steroid stash consisted of steroids manufactured in Mexico and sold under the brand names XT Labs and Astrovet Veterinarian Products. Astrovet and XT Labs are two of the many relatively new brands of anabolic steroids originating in Mexico that have replaced the void left by Operation Gear Grinder. Operation Gear Grinder temporarily disrupted the illicit United States steroid trade by shutting down eight Mexican companies that accounted for an estimated 82% of the black market steroid trade. The Operation targeted Quality Vet, Denkall and Animal Power, Laboratorios Tornel, Laboratorios Brovel, Pet’s Pharma, Syd Group and Loeffler.
The Bangkok airports resumed full operations today after an eight-day closure which brought international commerce in Thailand to a standstill with unfortunate consequences for anabolic steroid users who purchase their gear from Thailand-based sources. The blockade of Bangkok’s airport will nonetheless result in delayed steroid shipments and increased the numbers of lost parcels over the next few weeks (”No packages from Thailand this Christmas,” November 29).
International items are now being redirected via neighboring countries such as Malaysia and Singapore. I presume these countries will have a field day scanning the Thai mail for contraband. There have been multiple reports of packages simply vanishing off the tracking systems altogether.
The People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD) forced the closure of Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi International Airport, Asia’s fourth busiest airport, and Don Muang Airport, a major international hub for Asian air traffic, for the past week. The anti-government group occupied the airports demonstrating against Thailand’s People’s Power Party in a case of electoral fraud demanding that the ruling party’s Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat resign. The political upheaval has crippled the economy, not only the tourism industry, but the Thai export business including the thriving pharmaceutical steroid business. The seige ended and airports reopened after a Thai court removed Wongsawat from her post (”Protracted Thai Crisis Is Choking Its Economy,” December 1).
Many businesses rely heavily on Bangkok’s airports to move their goods and supplies, especially Suvarnabhumi, a $4 billion facility opened two years ago, normally moves about 100,000 passengers a day. Bangkok handles an estimated 3% of the world’s air cargo.
Some businesses are now sending goods for export roughly 1,000 kilometers overland through Thailand’s southern neighbor, Malaysia. But that involves a full day’s journey by road or rail through stretches of southern Thailand, where a bloody Islamic separatist insurgency has left 3,000 people dead since 2004.
Officials at Thailand’s Board of Investment said Friday that customs officials at the Malaysian border “cannot cope” with all the traffic, and were planning to keep checkpoints open around the clock to move more vehicles.
The impact of the airport sieges is spreading by the day. Thailand’s postal service says it has 23 metric tons, or 240,000 pieces of mail waiting to be delivered..
Law enforcement agencies in Louisiana have conducted a “controlled delivery” of anabolic steroids this week acknowledging that there was “nothing unusual” about the steroid bust pointing out that they intercept packages originating in Europe, Asia and South America.
In this case, the Louisiana State Police were tipped off by U.S. Immigration and Customs Service officials in California to a large package of steroids that originated in China and was address to an individual in Thibodaux, Louisiana . Undercover agents from the Thibodaux Police Deparment and the Lafourche Sheriff’s Department dressed up as mail carriers in a controlled delivery to bust Clint Schwab
The INTERPOL operation codenamed Pangea targeted internet pharmacies in ten countries that were selling counterfeit pharmaceuticals. Operation Pangea involved regulatory agencies associated with INTERPOL from the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, Germany, Ireland, Israel, New Zealand, Singapore and Switzerland.
The first international Internet day of action co-ordinated by the Permanent Forum on International Pharmaceutical Crime, INTERPOL and the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) International Medical Products Anti-Counterfeiting Taskforce (IMPACT), targeting the illegal online sale of medicines to the public has resulted in a series of arrests and the seizure of potentially harmful medicines in operations carried out around the world.
Codenamed Pangea, the operation focused on those individuals behind Internet sites which illegally sell and supply unlicensed or prescription-only medicines claiming to treat a range of ailments.
While steroids and steroid pharmacies were not specifically targeted, Operation Pangea has significant ramifications for international steroid distribution. The most significant consequence results from a new definition of counterfeit drugs proposed by a World Health Organization’s (WHO) funded body allegedly supported by pharmaceutical multi-national corporations (MNCs).
The passage of a new anti-doping law will criminalize the manufacture, importation, exportation, storage and distribution of anabolic steroids in the Czech Republic. Offenders who violate the anti-doping laws face one to three years imprisonment. The actual consumption of anabolic steroids will not become illegal, but the possession of steroids for non-medical use could lead to criminal investigation.
The purchase of anabolic steroids have long required a medical prescription within the Czech Republic. However, prior to the current steroid legislation, Czech drug laws did not regulate the import, export or distribution in the Czech Republic. These loopholes permitted an underground steroid marketplace worth hundreds of millions of Czech crowns to thrive virtually unimpeded. Czech Customs could only intervene and seize anabolic steroids imported from other countries if the sender failed to declare the merchandise as “anabolic steroids.” As a result Czech bodybuilders and athletes could previously import and use steroids without any legal consequences.
Czech Police are preparing to crack down hard on steroid use as soon as the legislation criminalizing the non-medical use of steroids takes effect
