On the morning of Wednesday 9 September 2026, police arrested three people in Rivera and seized 355 cannabis plants.[1][2][3][4] A 24-year-old man had no criminal record.[1][2][4] A 32-year-old man and a 61-year-old woman did.[1][2][5]

The raids were Operation Manantial, run by the national police investigations directorate through its northern region in Rivera.[1] The special operations directorate, the police aviation directorate and the rural security brigade of the Rivera police took part, under a semi-specialised prosecutor in Rivera.[1] Investigators had concluded that the people they were following had a large cannabis planting in a rural part of the department.[1] They carried out six searches in the city of Rivera and in the countryside.[1][2]

Officers seized 355 cannabis plants and five nylon bags of plant material weighing 4.732 kg in all.[1][2][3] They also took a shotgun, a pistol with its numbers filed off, a chumbera, two pickup trucks and a motorcycle.[1][2] From the growing site they took a gas cylinder, a thermometer, a machete, three mobile phones, soil fertiliser, 110 black pots and three bags of soil.[1][2] A judge ordered the three held and brought to the prosecutor that afternoon.[1]

El Observador reported the same seizures and the same three people the next day, from the Interior Ministry.[6][3] National police chief José Manuel Azambuya said the operation was in the same strategic line as a cocaine and coca-paste seizure in Artigas and Salto the week before, and that the two inquiries were separate.[6]

A 32-year-old man with a criminal record was sentenced to four years in prison for producing raw materials in the form of negotiating prohibited narcotics, plus usurpation, handling stolen goods and carrying a firearm with its identification marks removed.[5] A 24-year-old man was sentenced to three and a half years in prison for producing raw materials and the continued supply of prohibited narcotics, among other offences.[5] The Interior Ministry said the 32-year-old was convicted as the perpetrator of production of raw materials under the negotiating modality, a usurpation offence, a handling offence and the firearms offence, all in real reiteration.[4] The ministry said the 24-year-old was convicted of producing raw materials and the continued supply of prohibited narcotics, all in real reiteration, and given three years and six months.[4] The Interior Ministry said the plants, the substance, the vehicles and the weapons seized in the operation had all been confiscated by the courts.[4] Rivera prosecutor Alejandra Domínguez said the investigation had not established where the production was to go.[5] The prosecutor recalled that a drug plantation had been found on the same estate years earlier, involving the same accused man.[5] Telenoche reported that Domínguez dated that earlier planting to 2019 and 2020, in procedures that involved the same suspect.[7] A 61-year-old woman also detained in the operation, found on a nearby smallholding, was released for lack of evidence against her.[5] Telenoche reported that the plantation stood inside a Cofusa estate on Ruta 5, on forestry company land that the accused had invaded, and could only be reached by motorcycle.[7]