By: Dorjana Bezat*
On September 2, 2022, the anti-drug operation "Poseidon" took place in Peru by the local authorities, in cooperation with the American DEA, the Italian Guardia Di Finanza and the German police. Thanks to this operation in Peru and Germany, a cocaine trafficking network consisting of an Albanian and Italian criminal group was destroyed. The Albanian criminal group and that of Ndragheta had found in Peru the source from which they obtained tons of super pure cocaine. He was Werlinton Mauro Sanches Garcia who was known by the nickname Tyson in Casuarinas. He started this journey from the ground up to become a drug lord who lived in unbridled luxury in a luxurious villa with a swimming pool, large gardens, a gym and a Jacuzzi.
He also owned small planes that he put into operation for criminal activity and flew with them to Brazil, Colombia and Bolivia. He was known by the nickname "Tyson" because of his physical resemblance to the famous American boxer. His tracing led to the discovery of two criminal organizations, the Italian and the Albanian. The Albanian organization consisted of 3 people. It was led by Robert Suloti, an Albanian citizen who is unknown in his country, while in Peru he is considered a big fish. While his two trustees are Emiljano Mamo and Kadri Gjoci.
When asked about the Albanian traffickers who are almost anonymous in their country, the professor of criminology Ervin Karamuço said that their profile is moved from the Albanian territory to another territory. They have shown all their managerial and criminal skills in relation to a market that does not work in Albania at the level that works in the ports, especially in northern Europe. There they find their habitat in combination and coordination with other organized criminal groups. In Albania, they do not have any direct goals, therefore they come as ordinary people and of course they show their personality profiles of psychological disorders and violence and aggression, but not related to another criminal offense.
The 39-year-old Emiljano Mamo from Fieri, Albania is not unknown to the Albanian Police. In April 2018, he was declared wanted by the state police after being accused of attempted murder and illegal possession of firearms. On April 14, Emiljano Mamo together with his cousin tried to kill Arbër Jakupin with a firearm. The incident happened in the middle of the city of Fier where Jakupi was wounded with a knife and then he was shot with a gun. At that time the authorities said that the incident happened due to weak motives.
But almost a month after the incident on May 16, 2018, the search for him was canceled and Mamo continued his normal activity in Albania, where his frequent trips outside Albania stand out. In October 2022, he left Albania for the last time by means of an economic line.
While the 28-year-old from Rrësheni Kadri Gjoçi had experienced emigration very early, as well as the heavy burden of prison. On December 14, 2019, he landed at the "Mother Teresa" airport in Rinas, Albania as a deportee from the French state. In the interview at the Rinas police station, he stated that he had been sentenced to 10 years for drug trafficking in France. After settling accounts with the justice system there, he came to his homeland to stay only for a while, as the plans to penetrate the drug world were clear in his head. With a suitcase in hand on June 10, 2021, he would leave Albania to go to Peru and connect with Ndragheta with the final goal of trafficking cocaine to Europe, a job he had started years ago.
Although in his country of birth he had no criminal record in Peru he became part of a mafia that flooded Europe with Cocaine.
After they were identified, the three Albanians were followed by the police day and night everywhere they went because the Peruvian police had information that they, together with Tyson, were preparing something big. It was a matter of days when the observations brought to light that the Albanian Emiljano Mamo was associated with the Italian Pasquale Bifulcon, part of the famous Ndragheta for controlling 80% of the cocaine traffic in Europe.
The Italian was previously involved and convicted of drug trafficking in 2014 and according to Europol was the most active trafficker in Europe. He gained freedom in 2016, but the DEA was after him. To launder the drug money, he had invested in mining and construction.
The three Albanians lived in a house in Lima, which they used not only to live in, but also as a warehouse for the drugs they obtained from Tyson.
Hundreds of kilograms of drugs were found hidden in the chassis of a van used by them. Another quantity of drugs was found hidden in the house. In addition to cocaine, the police seized money, weapons and vehicles.
As a result of the sudden police operation, Kadri Gjoci and Pasquale Bifulcon, Luis Alberto Narbasya Huayanay, 57, were seized, from whom 5.3 kilograms of cocaine, two vehicles and communication equipment were seized, as well as Elmer Cárdenas Ramírez, 56. from whom a shotgun and 2 other firearms were confiscated.
While the head of the traffic, the Peruvian Werlinton Mauro Sanches Garcia (Tyson) and the two Albanians Emiljano Mamo and Robert Suloti escaped.
This whole network was built to take the cocaine to the port of Hamburg in Germany. The information of the investigators about the Italian-Albanian gang was so accurate and effective that they allowed about 3 tons of cocaine to be taken from Peru to the port of Hamburg in Germany. What the traffickers didn't know was that the police were watching this cargo. The operation of the DEA and the Peruvian police was carried out simultaneously with Germany, where a Turkish-German citizen, who would be responsible for receiving the goods, was arrested.
Drug shipments were leaving Alto Huallaga for Lima and Tumbes in order to be transported by sea from the port of Callao to Europe under the "company-to-company export" mode. The agents, after learning that the criminal organization was sending a significant shipment of drugs to Italy and Hamburg (Germany), decided to intervene. The operation was signed by the Peruvian judge Victor A. Alcocer Acosta.
The investigations of the Peruvian authorities began on November 3, 2021, when a confidential source told them that a person known by the nickname "Spaghetti Hermando" was involved in drug trafficking. He was later identified as Pasquale Bifulco who on November 23 met with a person known by the nickname Ormeno who was later identified as the Albanian Emiljano Mamo. The observations continued revealing other members of the group, the main one being Tyson who was identified as Werlinton Mauro Sanches Garcia. Kadri Gjoci was known by the nickname Gianmarko, Luis Alberto Narbasta Huayanay was known by the name Acuna.
Peruvians and Albanians in cooperation to explore new ways of traffic
Three Peruvians and one Albanian were arrested in Spain in December 2020 after they were caught trafficking 72 kg of pure cocaine from Peru. The protagonists were committed to implementing a super scenario, but in the end, it was discovered by the authorities and the perpetrators ended up in police custody for cocaine trafficking from Peru to Europe. Luis Vasconsuelo, Víctor Meneses, Edgard Sotomayor, all three from Lima, and 44-year-old Auron Dule, born in Vlora, Albania, were involved.
The aim of this Group was to find a new traffic route, discreet without being noticed by anyone. The traffickers traveled to the port of Aviles in Asturias (Spain) to unload the cocaine that was hidden on a merchant ship that had departed from Callao (Peru). The arrested Peruvians were two navy divers and a former marine. The police operation took place in the port of Avilés, Asturias, after the authorities were alerted to the presence of a cargo of drugs on the ship "Thomas C" with the flag of the Marshall Islands. The Albanian Auron Dule was waiting for them at the port in a vehicle to receive the promised load of 72 kilograms of cocaine. For the Spanish authorities, the cocaine is definitely Peruvian.
Luis Vasconsuelo left Peru shortly before his associates Víctor Meneses and Edgard Sotomayor, on February 24, 2020, heading to Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Due to the several trips that Vasconsuelo made between 2018 and 2019 to Colombia, Mexico, Brazil and Panama, the authorities do not rule out that his role was as a coordinator of some shipments of cocaine to Europe. The presence of Albanian Auron Dule has attracted the attention of officials because he was wanted internationally as part of an international organization that distributes cocaine in Eastern Europe. Dule was arrested in Italy in 2018 for trafficking various types of narcotics from Turkey to Italy. While in Europe he was a trafficker connected to Peruvian groups, in Albania Aron Dule kept a low profile. He lived in Vlorë and the only contact he had with the Albanian police was when unidentified persons burned his Ford Fiesta car parked under the building where he lived in the “28 November” quarter of Vlora. The verifications revealed that the Ford Fiesta vehicle with license plate VL7613C worth about 5 thousand euro was intentionally burned.
While, Vasconsuelo was under the surveillance of DEA agents. When he went to Barcelona, he made contact with the drug trafficker on the run from justice, the Albanian Auron Dule. Vasconsuelo and Dule did not know that the DEA had them under surveillance. They were followed from Barcelona to Avilés, where they rented a house. After a while, anti-narcotics agents discovered that the Peruvian and the Albanian were also connected with Víctor Meneses López and Edgar Sotomayor Urcuhuaranga. When the police discovered that they were divers from the Peruvian navy, it was clear that it was the new way they had tried to smuggle cocaine into Europe. Dule led the Peruvians to an area close to the port of Avilés. The agents waited to dive in and take the drugs from "Thomas C" and return to land to capture them. Upon learning of the operation, Auron Dule tried to escape but was arrested by the authorities.
Auron Dule, together with the three Peruvians, traveled to the port of Avilés, in Asturias, to implement the brilliant plan, which failed, leading them to the handcuffs of the police. Those arrested were identified as Meneses López, Edgar Sotomayor Urcuhuaranga and Luis Vasconsuelo Rodrigo. While they unloaded the drugs, the Albanian citizen Auron Dule was waiting for them in a car to take the 72 kilograms of narcotics that were seized.
Foreign media state that Víctor Meneses López and Edgard Sotomayor were diving and salvage technicians (BSA) working for the Peruvian Navy. They left for Spain on March 4 this year. At first, they appeared to be on vacation, but in fact they had become part of an international drug trafficking organization, exactly as infiltrators, in the shipment of cocaine on the ship Thomas C and its unloading in Avilés, a well-known port for bringing in drugs coming from South America.
*With the collaboration of Renzo Bambarén, journalist from Peru.