Marijuana Again Stashed In Ford Auto Shipments From Mexico

METRO DETROIT, MI — For the second time in a month, leaders at Ford Motor Co. are scratching their heads over the discovery of hundreds of pounds of marijuana stashed in a shipment of Ford and Lincoln vehicles from the automaker’s assembly plant in Mexico. Ford employees found 227 pounds of pot in a rail car at the Ford Rail Distribution Facility in Woodhaven and turned it over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials Wednesday, according to reports.

Earlier this month, pot with an estimated street value of $1 million was discovered inside the spare tire wells of Ford Fusion cars assembled in Mexico and shipped to Lordstown, Ohio, for delivery to dealerships. In March, authorities in Dilworth, Minnesota, found several packages of marijuana, also hidden in the trunk wheel wells, in a shipment of Fusions from Mexico. Drugs were also found in Ford Fusions in Arizona in May.

Steve Francis, the head of Homeland Security Investigations in Detroit, said agency will continue its investigation. No arrests have been made, but investigators are following multiple leads, he said.

“The seizure ensures that these illegal drugs will never be distributed to our communities and offers actionable intelligence that HSI and our partners can now develop into a larger probe,” he said in a news release. (For more local news, click here to sign up for real-time news alerts and newsletters from Detroit Patch, and click here to find your local Michigan Patch. If you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app.)

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Ford spokeswoman Kelli Felker said the automaker is taking the use of its vehicles and rail shipments as drug couriers “very seriously.”

“We are working closely with a number of law enforcement agencies on this investigation, including the FBI, Customs, Department of Homeland Security and local police,” Felker said in an email statement to The Detroit News. “We cannot comment further as this is an active investigation.”

In Ohio, investigators said they figured someone was supposed to retrieve the pot from the Ford Fusions before they arrived at the CSX yard in Lordstown, Silverio Balzano, who heads the DEA’s Youngstown, Ohio, office, told CNN. They’re also not sure at what point during shipment the marijuana was planted in the vehicles.

“Clearly, something went wrong,” Balzano said. “Generally speaking, they could take it off anywhere else along the way.”

Photo courtesy of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement