Metropolitan Police Department Narcotics Unit Officer Speaks Out, Revealing Name and Face… “40 kg of Stimulants in a Thresher”: The Full Story of a Top-Secret Operation Against a Drug Cartel

A “threshing machine loaded with stimulants” was shipped from Mexico

It was about 15 years ago that Asian law enforcement agencies first provided us with such information. We immediately shared the information with Tokyo Customs and discovered that something resembling this was coming in from Mexico via Hong Kong. It was eventually determined that the sender was a Mexican drug cartel; they were attempting to camouflage the shipment by adding an intermediary step.

It was extremely unnatural for Japan—an industrialized nation where rice is the staple food—to import a threshing machine from Mexico.When I went to Tokyo Customs to inspect the actual item, it turned out to be nothing more than “something called a threshing machine” equipped with a massive metal roller. It was poorly made and full of gaps. It didn’t look like it could thresh anything at all. After removing it from the container and running it through an X-ray, we discovered that nearly 40 kilograms of stimulants had been stuffed inside the roller.

Fumitaka Kobikimaki (52), a former assistant superintendent with the Metropolitan Police Department, joined the force in 1993. Until his retirement in 2023, he spent most of his 30-year career as an international investigator dedicated to combating drug trafficking and organized crime.In this article, we asked him about the battle of wits against criminal organizations that attempt to smuggle drugs using every trick in the book.

As I mentioned before, when Customs intercepts a drug smuggling attempt, it is standard procedure to conduct a CD (Controlled Delivery) operation. The goal is not to seize the drugs at Customs, but to apprehend the buyer at the delivery destination.

Ideally, we would have conducted a CCD (Clean Controlled Delivery), where we swap the contents for something like salt, but the thresher’s rollers were too sturdy to extract the contents, so we had no choice but to proceed with an LCD (Live Controlled Delivery), letting the actual package pass through as is.

The customs broker was a shady company run by two Chinese nationals that had only been in business for a few months, but we let them handle the procedures as is. A Japanese shipping company handled the delivery. The police made no contact with either party whatsoever, as we had no way of knowing where members of the cartel might be hiding. Under strict secrecy, the tracking of the truck carrying the thresher began.Four motorcycles, ten cars, and a helicopter tracked the vehicle from the air. Although we knew the delivery destination from the invoice, there was still a possibility—however slim—that the destination could be changed en route. This is the scary part of “Live (LCD).”

The thresher was delivered to the lavish mansion of a construction company president in Fukushima Prefecture. A tent—the kind used by guests and PTA members at school sports days—had been set up on the grounds, and tarps were draped around the perimeter to block the view from the outside.

He must be the president of a company that was once prosperous during the bubble economy but has since fallen on hard times.It was a large estate, but it was poorly maintained and falling into disrepair. Criminal organizations target such vulnerabilities. They bribe people to provide locations or store drugs. In fact, that president was a lackey for the local yakuza—not a full-fledged member, but a errand boy.

A week after we started the stakeout, something happened. Two foreigners of Latin American descent arrived at the mansion. The president drove them to a home improvement store. After confirming they were buying grinders and crowbars, I braced myself, thinking, “It’s finally starting,” but those two foreigners just wouldn’t get to work (laughs).In the morning, we could hear scraping noises coming from inside the tent, but by the afternoon, they were already drinking beer.

I considered raiding the place when someone came to pick up the stimulants or when they were being transported out, but since this was a “live” operation, I decided to go in only after the stimulants were extracted from the thresher.If we moved in too early, they’d claim, “We’re just engineers repairing machinery,” and if we waited too long, the stimulants would end up on the black market.

A month and a half after we began the stakeout, the roller was destroyed, and we raided the site after confirming that the extracted stimulants were piled up inside the tent.

Watching the methamphetamine crystallize right before our eyes

There are concerns about letting suspects slip through the cracks in LCD investigations. In fact, Mr. Kobikimaki has experienced this himself. He recalls that one case that left a strong impression on him was the “Snow Globe Incident,” in which “the Metropolitan Police Department set up an investigation headquarters and tracked down the suspect within Ibaraki Prefecture.”

A man named R, who held dual Japanese and Colombian citizenship, was plotting to smuggle methamphetamine, and the team in charge raided the delivery location. However, while they seized the drugs, R escaped. It had become a “headless methamphetamine” case with no suspect in custody.

That “goods” turned out to be a “snow globe.” It’s a transparent dome filled with liquid, containing miniature buildings and figures; when turned upside down, white powder swirls around as if snow were falling. It’s a classic souvenir, isn’t it?

He had been smuggling the raw stimulant solution inside those domes. The confiscated snow globe was about 30 cm in diameter. It was packed alone in a cardboard box lined with cushioning material. By straining out the impurities with a sieve and boiling down the solution to evaporate the water, it crystallizes right before your eyes.I think one of them yielded about 400 grams. At wholesale prices, that’s 4 to 5 million yen. At street value, it comes to about 12 million yen.

R had smuggled drugs using this method twice before. However, just like the thresher mentioned earlier, the quality was poor. It was a crude construction, simply glued together with adhesive, and in fact, some of the concentrate had leaked onto the cardboard and crystallized. That’s what led customs officials to discover it.

Still, the case wouldn’t be solved unless we arrested the culprit. We went around to all the relevant agencies but couldn’t track down his whereabouts. As I was nervously reviewing R’s call history, I found the phone number of a local yakuza member I’d had my eye on for some time. I also discovered that there was a detective at the Metropolitan Police Department who was using that yakuza member, S, as an informant.He was a detective I knew personally.

I explained the situation and laid my cards on the table, saying, “In the worst-case scenario, we might have to arrest S.” The detective knew R and told me, “Even though they haven’t even exchanged the traditional sake cup, R has been going around telling everyone, ‘I’m his underling,’ and S is fed up with it.”Not wanting to miss this opportunity, I asked to meet with S, who told me, “R is trying to flee overseas.”

I paid a fee for the tip and immediately contacted the Ibaraki Passport Center. Sure enough, he was in the process of applying, and his destination was Colombia. I also asked Tokyo Customs for backup, and with a team of 20, we staked out the passport center. The moment he received it, we tapped him on the shoulder and said,

“Police. You get it, right?”

Although his girlfriend was standing right next to him, R was taken into custody without resistance.

Click here for the second part of the article, which details how we solved other drug smuggling cases

From the June 19, 2026 issue of ‘FRIDAY’