Given cigarettes are a precious commodity in prisons, you can only imagine just what people would do for drugs – so smuggling them into prison is the criminal’s version of the Holy Grail.
That’s probably why people, cats, dogs and birds have all been used to try and get illegal substances through the bars of jails – and the latest trick was to use a pigeon – and guess how well it turned out.
The pigeon was obviously caught by guards at La Reforma Penitentia, in San Jose, and must have given them quite a shock when they looked in the little bag that was strapped to the bird.
He was carrying 14 grams of cocaine and 14 grams of marijuana, which is a pretty big load for such a small bird.
Prison director Paul Bertozzi claimed:
They observed the bulge on the animal so they captured it and confirmed that it carried a bag with zipper – and the drugs were inside… It seems the dove was trained for it.
The poor pigeon is being locked up for the next 40 days, to make sure it doesn’t fly straight back to the people who originally strapped the drugs onto it.
