Antwerp police have found 100 kg of cocaine in a flat near the Boekenbergpark in the Deurne-Zuid district. A 16-year-old was guarding the cocaine and has been arrested.
The Antwerp police zone was conducting anonymous surveillance in the area of the park on Saturday night, which experienced regular nuisances due to drug use and sales. Around 18:00, inspectors spotted a man with an electric scooter driving around the neighbourhood.
"After several calls, he went to an apartment building in the Boekenberglei street," police told De Standaard. He rang the doorbell and a young man opened the door. The latter handed the man on the scooter a large shopping bag.
As the inspectors suspected that a drug deal had taken place, they wanted to check the man on the scooter, who immediately dropped his vehicle and the shopping bag and took off running, trying to throw his mobile phone on the roof of a house.
Stash
"That failed, after which the man tried to kick the device to pieces," police said. The 27-year-old man could be arrested, despite fierce resistance. His bag was found to contain 8 kg of cocaine, and he also had €1,000 and another mobile phone in his pocket.
The officers then conducted a search of the apartment building in the Boekenberglei street, where a 16-year-old boy – the one who had handed over the shopping bag – was found to be present. Inside, 100 kg of cocaine were found, as well as €220,000, four alarm guns (blank guns) and a machine to count money.
"The underage boy was brought before the juvenile court and placed in a closed institution," said Antwerp Prosecutor Office's spokesperson Kristof Aerts. "The 27-year-old man was brought before the investigating judge and has been detained."
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The man, from the Antwerp district of Borgerhout, had previously also been prosecuted in an extensive drugs case.
It appears that the property was a so-called "stash" of a criminal organisation: the place where blocks of cocaine are kept waiting to be sold to dealers and middlemen. The 16-year-old suspect was most likely assigned to guard the load.
