031135 Cocaine Found in Shipment of H&H Meat

Mercedes, TX - A Valley meat-packing company is at the center of an interstate drug smuggling investigation. Agents say drugs were found packed into boxes carrying food.

H&H Meats is nearly synonymous with Mercedes. But the family-owned company is now in the midst of a crisis. Federal agents are probing the facility after cocaine turned up in two of their boxes of ground beef.

"Over 90-percent of the cocaine that is smuggled into the U.S., has to come through here first," says drug trafficking expert Lupe Trevino.

But this time the smuggling tactics put kids at risk and outraged parents. The meat ended up at a pair of Mississippi elementary schools.

H&H's president wouldn't go on camera, but did release this statement to Action 4 News: "First, let me assure you that our company had nothing to do with this unfortunate incident. The matter under investigation involves an outside carrier and we are cooperating fully with federal officials to bring the guilty parties to justice."

Trevino has been trapping traffickers for over two decades. He says cocaine concealed along with frozen food is a pretty common occurrence.

"Now this thing with the meat does not surprise me either. Because who would think that they're going to freeze cocaine along with the meat?"

Trevino says drug dealers will go to any lengths to cross interstate lines.

"It's a pretty smart tactic, but that is going to dissolve as obviously this happened. It does not surprise me. Drug smugglers are using every, every tactic - even technology now to smuggle drugs."

Trevino says the plant probably fell prey to an unscrupulous employee, "the truck drivers take advantage of the situation by conveyance or facilitating the transportation of the drugs for a set fee."

The federal scrutiny is already hurting H&H. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has recalled all their meat packages. It'll take time for the corporation to make a comeback.

Action 4 News has also learned that H&H Foods has filed suit against the public carrier they hired for allegedly breaking USDA security seals.

Company leaders claim that the shipment was tampered with somewhere between their cold storage facility in Brownsville and its destination in Mississippi.

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