Homeland Security, NYPD team up on cannabis smuggling investigation

This article has been updated.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has teamed up with the New York National Guard and New York City Police Department to investigate illegal cannabis smuggling across the U.S., potentially by international crime rings with roots in Eastern Europe, Green Market Report has learned.

The New York National Guard Counterdrug Task Force is looking into “illicit cannabis coming across state lines and being sold in New York,” a source close to the investigation told Green Market Report.

The investigation is being spearheaded by the NYPD and Homeland Security. The Drug Enforcement Administration is not yet involved, nor is any other federal agency, he said.

The source said he was just assigned to the case, which is “an interstate federal case involving illicit cannabis trafficking, marijuana cultivation, distribution, money laundering, human trafficking, shell companies, and other illegal activities.”

Law enforcement intelligence has identified farms in California that are connected to the case he’s working on, and which are being used to launder money, “But we want to be able to track how are they moving (cannabis) from California to New York, and where’s it going,” he said.

The case isn’t only about illicit marijuana, the source emphasized. In fact, that’s not even necessarily the central focus of the investigation.

“It’s bigger than that. It’s involving major multinational crime. We’re talking about financial crimes, human trafficking, forced labor,” he said. “It’s a big case.”

The investigation is looking at illicit cannabis sales in New York and California, possible open-source trucking routes between the two states, track-and-trace data and programs, and so-called “burner distributors” shipping legal cannabis from California to New York.

Homeland Security was also involved in seven search warrants being executed in New York on smoke shops that were allegedly selling illegal marijuana “after a year-long investigation,” the Westchester Journal News reported Thursday. Those warrants were executed at two shops in Clarkstown, two in Orangetown, and one in the Village of Suffern. The businesses searched were not identified by name.