Peruvian police officers disguised as Father Christmas and his elves carried out a raid in a Lima neighbourhood, arresting four suspected drug traffickers and seizing a large quantity of narcotics, police said on Monday.
The operation took place on Saturday in the Surquillo neighbourhood, parts of which are nicknamed 'Chicago Chico' due to their insecurity - a reference to the violent gangs that operated in the US city of Chicago in the 1920s.
“It’s Christmas time and having a Father Christmas on the streets doesn’t attract attention. That’s what we took advantage of to carry out the intervention,” Colonel David Villanueva of the national police told America TV.
Arriving in front of a house, one of Santa’s elves, dressed in a red suit with white edge, took a battering ram and smashed the wooden door of a house. She was a policewoman.
She and her colleagues rushed in, according to footage released by the police. Instead of “Merry Christmas,” the suspects heard: “Police! Freeze!”
The footage shows Santa arresting one of the inmates inside the house. In total, three men and one woman were detained. They had initially thought it was a prank, police said.
The operation resulted in the seizure of 6,000 small packets of cocaine paste, 104 bags of cocaine and 279 bags of marijuana hidden in the house.
Peru is considered one of the world’s largest producers of cocaine, along with Colombia and Bolivia.
