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A veterinarian has pleaded not guilty to US charges that he turned puppies into drug couriers for a Colombian trafficking ring by stitching packets of liquid heroin into their bellies.
- Andres Lopez Elorza became a fugitive in 2005
- He's accused of being part of a barbaric scheme that turned dogs into "animal couriers"
- Investigators believe some puppies would have died in the process, but they don't know how many
Andres Lopez Elorza was arraigned in a US Federal Court on Tuesday (local time) on an indictment of conspiring to import and distribute heroin into the United States, the US Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York said.
Mr Lopez Elorza, 38, who also goes by Lopez Elorez, became a fugitive in 2005 when authorities arrested about two dozen suspected traffickers in Colombia.
Before he fled, the defendant had "gained some notoriety" from accusations that he was part of a barbaric scheme that turned an undetermined number of puppies and dogs into "animal couriers".
The puppies, mostly purebred dogs including Labrador retrievers, had their bellies cut open and heroin stitched in, assistant US Attorney Nathan Reilly told a magistrate judge.
They were then exported to the United States with the smugglers hoping the dogs' pedigrees would help ease their path through customs, the US Drug Enforcement Administration has said.
It is believed that the dogs were sent on commercial flights to New York City, where the drugs were cut out of them, authorities said.
Investigators believe some puppies would have died in the process, but it was unknown how many were involved.
"Over time, drug organisations' unquenchable thirst for profit leads them to do unthinkable crimes like using innocent puppies for drug concealment," James J Hunt, head of the US Drug Enforcement Administration's New York office, said in a statement.
"Dogs are man's best friend and, as the defendant is about to learn, we are drug dealers' worst enemy," Richard Donoghue, US attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said in a statement.
"He betrayed a veterinarian's pledge to prevent animal suffering when he used his surgical skills in a cruel scheme to smuggle heroin in the abdomens of puppies."
Ten puppies were found during a 2005 raid on a farm in Colombia, DEA officials said.
Five ended up running away, three died from infection and two were adopted, including one that became a drug-sniffing dog for Colombian police, officials said.
Mr Lopez Elorza was born in Colombia but claims Venezuelan citizenship, authorities said.
His attorney, Mitch Dinnerstein, declined to comment on Tuesday.
AP/Reuters
Topics: law-crime-and-justice, drug-offences, animal-welfare, united-states, colombia
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