Orange County Snowfall Averted

​Three separate busts over the past couple weeks in Orange County prevented cocaine authorities say was worth $20 million from reaching their destinations.

Orange County Regional Narcotics Suppression Program officers served a warrant on Jean-Francois Gosselin's motor home at Newport Dunes Waterfront Resort in Newport Beach on Jan. 20 and uncovered 92 individually wrapped packages of blow, according to an Orange County Register report.

Cops claimed each package weighed a kilogram and, at $200 per gram (inflation!), all 200 pounds of coke was worth $19 million.

Courtesy of OCDA

Jean-Francois Gosselin

​Gosselin, 34, of Mascouche, Quebec, is to be arrainged Feb. 25 on charges of possessing drugs with intent to sell and additionally possessing more than 80 kilograms. He is currently being held in Orange County Jail without bail.

Ten days later, U.S. Border Patrol agents seized 110 pounds of cocaine worth $1 million during two stops at the San Clemente checkpoint, the Register reports.

How is it that 200 pounds seized Jan. 20 can be worth $19 million and 110 pounds recovered on Jan. 30 be worth $1 million?

Deflation!

Or, perhaps the nose candy from the first bust was more pure.

U.S. Border Patrol

More than gasoline in there.

​What is known is that at about 9:30 a.m. Jan. 39 30, an 18-year-old Los Angeles man driving a 1991 Toyota Tercel was stopped at the border check. As he was being questioned by agents, canines sniffed out 15 bundles of cocaine hidden in a compartment built into the gas tank, said authorities, who claimed the white stuff weighed 39 pounds and was worth $392,000 on the street.

Then, at 7:15 p.m., a Ford F250 pickup driven by a 44-year-old Mexican national was stopped, and the canine search team discovered stuffed inside a spare tire 28 bundles of coke weighing 71.3 pounds and valued at $713,000.

The drivers and their hidden treasures were turned over to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.