It was an impressive operation fit for a blockbuster film – until he got busted by police.
Carlos Cunningham, 31, was found driving almost 10 tons of marijuana that had been smuggled into California through a sophisticated 600-yard tunnel from Mexico.
The ‘gigantic’ amount of drugs was ‘enough to fill a house’ and around 16 tons was also seized from inside the tunnel, which had a rail line, lighting and ventilation.
Cunningham, of Oceanside, California, has two previous drug smuggling convictions and was jailed for more than 21 years by U.S. District Judge Larry A. Burns.
‘This is a sit-up-and-take-notice amount of narcotics, even in a district where we have become jaded by very large amounts,’ Judge Burns said. ‘It’s a gigantic amount.’
