Bags of Cash Found in Man's Stomach at Airport

A person swallowed $47,500 in cash in an effort to smuggle it out of Colombia, say officials.

While preparing to board a flight bound for Lima, Peru, from Bogota Airport, the man was x-rayed by airport police who said they suspected something was up because he seemed nervous. When the police saw latex packages in the suspect’s stomach they assumed he was smuggling drugs.

But when the latex packages left the suspect’s body, they were found to contain cash.

“We find drugs inside the stomachs of smugglers all the time, but this is the first time we’ve ever found dollars,” said the head of Bogota’s airport police, Col. Jorge Luis Vargas.

Only $10,000 in cash is allowed to legally leave Colombia on a passenger’s person without having to declare it. The policy is meant to make drug smuggling more difficult.

Vargas says that, based on information collected from the suspect in interviews, the money was probably going to be used to purchase drugs.