Smuggler in court

Teak with cocaine hidden in Viennese terrace?

Cocaine was smuggled from Bolivia to Austria in these boards.

(Bild: LPD NÖ/Topf)

A Serbian gang is said to have smuggled over 260 kilograms of white gold hidden in wooden boards into Austria. The first defendant claims not to have known anything about the narcotics in the teak boards - they were used as normal ...

On average, over a dozen container ships enter the port of Hamburg every day - as was the case on September 13, 2023. One of the freighters from Bolivia routinely unloaded its goods. Which turned out to be a record drug find for the Austrian Federal Criminal Police Office and the Lower Austrian Criminal Police Office. Teak planks were seized in a container - hollowed out and filled to the brim with cocaine. A total of almost 135 kilograms worth almost 14 million euros.

Workshop and drug laboratory in Slovakian warehouse
The delivery was addressed to a Serb (46) who lives and trades in wood in Vienna. The shipping documents showed that the prepared boards were to be transported via Austria to a warehouse in Bratislava - "in order to open them, extract the cocaine from them and bring it back to Vienna in order to market it there for profit", according to the public prosecutor's office. 

The wood was seized by investigators.

(Bild: LPD NÖ)

This was probably not the first time that white gold was smuggled from South America to Europe via the first defendant's company. There was already a similar shipment in 2022: the sender was identical; teak planks were also delivered. Two years ago, however, customs did not find this suspicious. 21 cubic meters of wood with at least 130 kilograms of cocaine had thus arrived in Vienna. 

Drug wood used in Viennese terrace?
The timber dealer told the lay assessors in the Vienna regional court that he had not known anything about the "poison" in the teak boards - they had been used in a terrace as normal. However, the co-defendant client (45) of lawyer Philipp Wolm confirmed the sophisticated drug smuggling. He had taken over the communication with the supplier - a Bolivian drug cartel.

His accused accomplices do not even claim to have known anything about this: The 43-year-old timber merchant remains adamant that he had only ordered teak wood for a commissioned roof terrace. He did not know anything about the narcotics involved. A 41-year-old Serb and the 23-year-old client of lawyer Mirsad Musliu agree - they were already unsuspecting "hackers" in 2022.

Lawyers Philipp Wolm and Mirsad Musliu defend in the drug trial.

(Bild: Krone KREATIV/zVg Gerhard Bartel)

For them, loading the drug wood was a job like any other. They each received 100 euros and food from the confessing second defendant. Musliu says: "There is no such thing as someone deliberately moving over 100 kilograms of cocaine for 100 euros and a sandwich." 

Arrests and long prison sentences
But the jury saw things differently. They found all four guilty. However, the two "hackers" got off lightly as contributory offenders: they each received two years in prison; the younger one was even released after the trial. The 45-year-old Serb receives eight years. The most severe sentence was handed down to the timber merchant, who was also sentenced for an armed mail robbery in 2012 - twelve years in prison. Some of the sentences are already final.