PHOENIX – An alert officer with the Arizona Department of Transportation identified a fake delivery van which led to the arrest of its driver and recovery of a shipment of more than a half ton of marijuana.
The officer, with ADOT’s enforcement and compliance division was traveling the opposite direction on Interstate 15 in northwestern Arizona when he noticed that the vehicle.
It was traveling northbound toward the Virgin River Gorge, appeared to have authentic markings from a local delivery company, but had an out-of-state license plate on the front, said a statement from ADOT.
Officers caught up with the van and pulled it over. When officers found inconsistencies in the driver’s story and the van checked out as registered to a North Carolina address, a K-9 unit was summoned.
After the K-9 indicated the presence of narcotics, ADOT officers found large bags containing 1,113 pounds of pot, as well as 5 grams of a mushroom-based hallucinogenic, three vials of illegal steroids and $7,850 in cash.
The driver, a 48-year-old male, was booked into the Mesquite Detention Center in Nevada, pending transfer to the Mohave County Jail in Kingman.
ADOT officers enforce laws involving commercial vehicle safety, driver’s license and registration fraud, and other legal issues related to the auto industry. In 2018, the agency began deploying K-9 units to interdict drug and human smugglers, operating out of commercial ports.