A 48-year-old man living in Lecco province returned from a week in Málaga with only a small backpack and no suitcase, and Guardia di Finanza officers at Orio al Serio airport found a belt worn as a belly band holding 219 hashish pellets.[1][2][3] The hashish weighed 2.3 kilograms in total, and the man was arrested by soldiers of the Orio al Serio company of the Guardia di Finanza, Italy’s finance police, with staff of the airport detachment of the Agenzia delle Dogane e dei Monopoli, the customs agency.[1] Officials announced the case on Friday 6 November together with a second arrest, that of a 29-year-old courier who landed from Brussels after swallowing 83 pellets.[1]

A drug dog named Kenny alerted officers to the backpack of the passenger arriving from Spain, during intensified checks, including on night flights, of arrivals from Spanish and Belgian airports.[1][3] Investigators believe the 48-year-old was to be paid 1,500 euros to bring the drug to Italy and hand it to people he did not know, who would contact him outside the terminal; he told officers at the time of his arrest that he did not know the recipients.[4][3] Prima Bergamo reported that the man is unemployed with previous convictions for drug dealing.[5] The Guardia di Finanza said that, because of its high THC content, the hashish would have generated more than 51,000 euros of profit on the illegal market.[1]

The second arrest followed a tip from the Belgian customs authority, sent to the Italian customs agency under the Naples II Convention on mutual assistance between European Union customs administrations.[1] The 29-year-old, using the body-packer technique, had swallowed 77 heroin pellets and 6 cocaine pellets weighing 974 grams together and is not accused of carrying cannabis.[1] He had flown from Pisa to Eindhoven, travelled to Brussels by train and swallowed the pellets there shortly before boarding the flight to Orio al Serio, a double open jaw route with different departure and arrival airports intended to evade customs risk analysis.[1] The authorities said the proceedings were at the preliminary investigation stage and that the suspects’ guilt could be established only by a final conviction.[5]

According to Il Giorno, the two people who were to collect the hashish realised the handover had been dropped after the arrest and disappeared.[3]