Manifest said cargo at Otay border crossing was cardboard. Feds found $5M in meth

Federal agents found a huge stash of methamphetamine — with an estimated street value of nearly $5 million — hidden inside the cargo trailer of a big rig attempting to cross the U.S.-Mexico border in Otay Mesa earlier this month.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers made the discovery April 14 at the Otay Mesa Commercial Facility, the federal agency said in a news release last week.

A 31-year-old Mexican citizen driving a 2017 Freightliner Cascadia tractor with a trailer was attempting to cross. The vehicle’s shipment manifest indicated it was hauling corrugated cardboard boxes, the agency said.

Officers directed the big rig to a secondary inspection area. There, a “nonintrusive inspection revealed anomalies within the trailer’s front wall,” Customs and Border Protection officials said. A drug-sniffing dog got a hit on the same area.

A closer look revealed 300 packages containing a crystal-like substance wrapped in clear plastic and stacked inside. The agency said the substance tested positive for methamphetamine, and the combined packages weighed more than 3,000 pounds.