Subutex tablets worth €1.8m smuggled to Finland from France

Finnish Customs is investigating a series of offences in which a criminal organisation has been transporting batches of the narcotic medicine Subutex from France to Finland, said Customs in a press release on Wednesday.

The narcotic medicines were brought to Finland among normal passenger traffic.

Five persons are suspects in the case.

Customs has seized a total of 19,929 Subutex tablets during the preliminary investigation.

The couriers travelled by air and brought the narcotics illegally from France to Finland via Belgium.

The narcotics were hidden in the luggage of the couriers. The investigation is also looking into other consignments of narcotics illicitly brought into the country by the same organisation.

“We suspect that from the beginning of this year the organisation has, on six different occasions, illicitly brought in a total of at least 60,000 Subutex tablets from France to Finland. The street value of the illicitly imported narcotics is around 1.8 million euros,” said the investigator in charge, Senior Customs Officer Janne Kallio.

Seizures of medicines classified as narcotics, narcotic medicines, have increased significantly during the beginning of the year. This year, Customs has already seized more than half a million tablets, which is more than the total amount for all of last year.

“It seems that at least partly, the criminal organisations have gone back to using passenger traffic, which has returned to normal after the Covid-19 pandemic,” said Kallio.

There are five suspects in the preliminary investigation, one Finn and four foreign citizens.

When the preliminary investigation has been completed, the case will be forwarded to the Prosecution District of Southern Finland for consideration of charges.