Two men held with 1,200 pounds of marijuana at Satuyé
National Police detained Walter Javier Ávila Juárez and Yadir Fernando Montoya at the Satuyé post in La Ceiba with 12 sacks of marijuana weighing 1,200 pounds. A criminal court ordered both held, and an initial hearing was set for 22 August 2016.
🇭🇳 Satuyé police post, La Ceiba, Atlántida · Honduras
In the early hours of a Tuesday, officers stopped a vehicle at the Satuyé police
post in La Ceiba and found 12 sacks of dry plant material treated as marijuana.[1]The police detained Walter Javier Ávila Juárez, 36, and Yadir Fernando
Montoya, 21.[2]Ávila Juárez was the driver and Montoya was travelling with
him as his helper.[1]The National Police, through the DPI and the preventive
police, made the seizure that morning in the Satuye sector of La Ceiba after
intelligence and surveillance.[2]The two men had been under investigation
through intelligence and surveillance.[3]
The police said they were in a white truck, plate AAJ-5647, carrying 12 sacks of
supposed marijuana of about 100 pounds each, 1,200 pounds in all, about 544
kilograms.[2]Proceso Digital called the find what appeared to be the largest
marijuana seizure of the year so far, in the Satuye sector of La Ceiba,
Atlántida.[4]The operation was carried out in the early hours of that
Tuesday.[4]The men and the drug were sent to the prosecutor’s office, to be
brought before the courts in La Ceiba.[4]
The same day the Special Prosecutor’s Office against Organised Crime, FESCCO,
filed a fiscal request against both men for illicit possession and trafficking
of drugs, to the detriment of the health of the population of Honduras.[1]A
criminal trial court ordered judicial detention.[1]The initial hearing was
set for 22 August.[1]
Photos and video
Sacks from the La Ceiba seizure; the page says each sack held 100 pounds of the drug. Photo: El HeraldoPhoto details
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Source: El HeraldoThe detained men with the seized sacks, which the page says the DPI would send to the prosecutor. Photo: El HeraldoPhoto details
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Source: El HeraldoWalter Javier Ávila Juárez and Yadir Fernando Montoya after the Satuyé stop. Photo: El HeraldoPhoto details
The police and prosecutor accounts, all dated 16 August 2016, place the stop in the early hours of that Tuesday and set a hearing for 22 August; none prints a separate calendar date for the stop, so 16 August 2016 is used.
Proceso Digital named the men Walter Javier Ávila Ordóñez and Javier Fernando Montoya and described each sack as about 100 kilos, while the police account and the prosecutor named Walter Javier Ávila Juárez and Yadir Fernando Montoya and counted about 100 pounds a sack; the police and prosecutor names and the 1,200-pound total are used.
El Heraldo placed the stop in Suyate; the police statement and the prosecutor placed it at the Satuyé post in La Ceiba.
The police described a white truck, plate AAJ-5647; the prosecutor described a rastra, a tractor-trailer.
No result of the 22 August 2016 initial hearing, and no sentence, was reported in these accounts.
Honduras's police investigation directorate (DPI) burned more than 400 pounds (about 181 kg) of marijuana in Tegucigalpa on 30 October 2026, eight days after seizing it in Marale from a suspect it calls 'El Colocho' of the 'El Diablo' cartel. The man arrested with the load and an AR-15 rifle remains in custody.
DNPA and DNPSC officers seized 131 pounds of suspected marijuana and the transport vehicle on 22 October 2026 at La Bolsa in Tocoa, Colón, during Plan Operativo Escudo. FESCCO in La Ceiba took the case; no arrests were reported.
Honduran anti-drug police raided a property in Comayagua under a judicial order and arrested one man. The search found 45 wraps of suspected marijuana besides 299 wraps of suspected cocaine, phones, cash and a video recorder.
On 19 September 2026 DNPA anti-drug officers in Puerto Cortés, Cortés, searched a minibus and found 28 bales with 1,300 pounds of suspected marijuana, valued preliminarily above 10 million lempiras. They detained three men aged 29, 55 and 68 for aggravated drug trafficking.
