Puppies implanted with drugs by traffickers

Police in Colombia and the United States have uncovered a drugs smuggling racket in which purebred puppies were implanted with large packets of liquid heroin and then passed off as show dogs being transported to New York to take part in breeding competitions.

The racket was broken up in Colombia a year ago but made public only this week as authorities in New York unsealed indictments against 10 defendants accused of running a ghoulish makeshift veterinary clinic on a farm outside Medellin, one of the hubs of the Colombia drugs trade.

According to the indictments, 10 dogs - mostly Labrador retrievers - were singled out for surgery, and six had had the heroin packets implanted inside the loose skin of their bellies by the time the operation was raided by Colombian police. A total of 14 packets were stuffed inside their bodies, weighing around 7lbs (3kg) - more than 1lb per puppy.

Three of the dogs subsequently died from complications arising from the implants. The others have had the packets surgically removed and are said to be thriving with new Colombian owners. None of the 10 dogs made it to the United States, but it was not clear whether others had preceded them across the border. A spokesman for the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) in New York said he thought it was unlikely the dogs would have been treated particularly tenderly once they arrived at their destination - strongly implying they were likely to have been killed in the course of the heroin removal process.

"I think it's outrageous and heinous that they'd use small, innocent puppies in this way," DEA official John Gilbride told reporters. "It just demonstrates what lengths drugs dealers will go to to get drugs into the country."

The dog-smuggling technique was just one of a handful of schemes uncovered in a series of raids resulting in more than 20 arrests in Colombia and a further 10 in New York, Florida and North Carolina. Authorities found evidence of heroin concealed in body creams and aerosol cans, pressed into bead shapes or sewn into the lining of purses and suitcases.

The starting point for the investigation was the seizure of about 50lbs of heroin at airports in Miami, New York, Medellin, Bogota and Cartagena. An informant led the Colombian authorities to the veterinary clinic outside Medellin, where they found the 10 dogs, six of them with scars on their bellies. An ultrasound test confirmed that something had been inserted into the bodies.

The arrests did not include the suspected veterinarian, who has been named as Andres Lopez Elorez and is now believed to be on the run in Spain.