A Puerto Rican man was arrested at Logan Airport Friday after State Police found more than eight pounds of cocaine in the wheelchair on which he rolled into the terminal, the Suffolk County District Attorney's office reports.
Emannuelli Rojas-Moraza, 33, of Carolina, PR, was detained at Terminal E by state troopers at the request of Homeland Security and US Customs agents. According to prosecutors:
Customs officials had detected an anomaly while X-raying the wheelchair Rojas-Moraza was using during entry screening. Agents drilled a hole in one of the chair’s tires and found a white substance that field-tested positive for cocaine. Troopers and federal agents disassembled the wheelchair and found within its tires and frame numerous blue pellets containing more cocaine. The total weight of the substance was 3.74 kilograms.
Rojas-Moraza, who was also wearing a cast on one of his legs, was transported to Whidden Memorial Hospital, where his leg was also X-rayed. A doctor assigned to his care opined that there was no structural damage to the leg necessitating a cast. The cast was removed and field-tested negative for narcotics. Clinicians replaced that cast with a walking cast as a medical precaution.
An East Boston District Court judge set bail at $45,000, the DA's office says, adding Rojas-Moraza had no medical reason to be in a wheelchair. The origin of the drugs remains under investigation, the DA's office says.
Innocent, etc.