Felipe Caicedo / AFP - Getty Images
A Colombian policeman from an anti-drug unit guards packages of cocaine, part of a seizure of 1,825 kg worth $3 million, during a press conference in Rioacha, Colombia, on Sept. 16. The drug belonged to the "Los Urabenos" drug trafficking gang.
Arnulfo Franco / AP
A member of the National Aerial Naval Service and a drug-sniffing dog, stand guard before a display of seized packaged cocaine.
Alejandro Bolivar / EPA
Seized cocaine is presented to the press in Panama City on March 13.
The Panamanian Navy seized 1.4 tons of cocaine and arrested three Colombians on a boat that was entering the Pacific coast of Panama. According to the director of operations for the National Aerial Naval Service, this was the largest drug seizure so far this year.
Mauricio Duenas / EPA
Members of counternarcotics police destroy a cocaine production laboratory in Puerto Concordia, Meta, Colombia, 25 January 2012, during an operation against FARC drug trafficking infrastructures, in which 17 laboratories were destroyed in southeastern jungles. Two planes, 22 boats, 692 kilograms of coca paste and 13 tons of substances used to produce the drug were seized and 10 people were arrested during the operation.
Fernando Vergara / AP
Police fly in helicopters over the area of Puerto Concordia during a raid to destroy a cocaine lab in Colombia's southern Meta state on Wednesday.
Mauricio Duenas / EPA
Members of counter-narcotics police secure a cocaine production laboratory in Puerto Concordia, Meta, Colombia.
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William Fernando Martinez / AP
Police officers walk next to a seized homemade fiberglass semi-submersible during a presentation to the press in Puerto Escondido, Colombia, Tuesday, Oct. 18, 2011. According to police, the semi-submersible was seized from drug traffickers during an operation in Puerto Escondido Monday.
Leonardo Muñoz / EPA
Members of Colombia´s anti drugs police stand guard over a submersible which belongs to criminal gang "Los Urabeños", seized in Puerto Escondido, Colombia, 18 October 2011. The boat, made out of fiberglass, has a capacity of six tons of cocaine.
William Fernando Martinez / AP
A cameraman works inside a seized homemade fiberglass semi-submersible during a presentation to the press in Puerto Escondido, Colombia, Tuesday, Oct. 18, 2011.
AFP - Getty Images
Handout medical image released by the Brazilian Federal Police showing bags with cocaine inside the gastrointestinal tract of a 20-year-old Irish national arrested by police at Congonhas airport in Sao Paulo, Brazil, on September 12. The man, identified only as P.B.B., was stopped whilst trying to board a flight outbound for Brussels with 72 bags containing almost a kilogram of the drug inside his intestines.
Brazilian police have released X-ray images of an Irishman they allege swallowed dozens of cocaine capsules in an attempt to smuggle the drug out of Sao Paolo.
I can't decide what's more amazing about this: the clarity of the medical imaging, or the number of bags of cocaine this man was able to stuff down his throat.
The 20-year-old was arrested Monday at Sao Paolo's Congonhas airport as he tried to board a flight to Lisbon, the Irish Independent reported Friday. He was en route to Brussels, the paper said. Read more in our full story...
Update: msnbc.com Health story: How can 72 bags of cocaine fit in man's belly?
Bruno Gonzalez / Agencia O Globo via Reuters
Bags of cocaine that a dealer labeled with a photograph of singer Amy Winehouse are seen at a police station in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on August 9.
Reuters reports that photographs of Amy Winehouse are being used as a form of marketing by Brazilian drug pushers. Several hundred bags of cocaine labeled with a photograph of the late singer and the words "Amy House" were confiscated from a dealer in the Mandela slum of Rio de Janeiro.
"Since there is so much information in the media that she was a drug user, the traffickers have taken advantage of this" to market their cocaine, Lieutenant Colonel Glaucio Moreira told local media, according to an AFP report.
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An underwater drug bust. What's next?
"This is a once-in-a-career thing that happens," said Lieutenant Commander Peter Niles, commanding officer of the Coast Guard Cutter Oak, whose crew located the sunken vessel.
See Mark Potter's Nightly News report about secret subs at the bottom of this post.
Hans Deryk / Reuters
A crew member from the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Oak counts packaged bales of 15,000 pounds of cocaine worth more than $180 million unloaded at Base Support Unit Miami August 2. The haul was recovered from a self-propelled submersible vessel in the western Caribbean Sea July 13, 2010 after being spotted by U.S. Coast Guard patrol.
U.S. Coast Guard / Getty Images
In this handout provided by U.S. Coast Guard, the crew of the Coast Guard Cutter Seneca interdicts a drug smuggling, self-propelled semi-submersible (SPSS) vessel carrying cocaine on an unspecified date in the western Caribbean Sea. It was the first interdiction of an SPSS in the Caribbean.
Dec. 28: Learn more about the secret subs examined by Mark Potter.
Alejandro Bolivar
Panamanian authorities present a 4,9 tons of cocaine in Panama City, Panama, 27 September 2010. The cocaine was confiscated over the weekend of 25-26 September 2010 during an operation in the province of Colon, in the Panamanian
Atlantic.
Alfredo Tedeschi / Reuters - Corbis file
Argentine soccer star Diego Maradona smokes a Cohiba cigar as he rides a sail boat in waters off Havana on April 8, 2000. Maradona had been in Cuba since January on a rehabilitation program to try to kick the cocaine habit that almost cost him his life at the beginning of the year.
As Argentina prepares to play Germany, I'm wondering what emotional pyrotechnics may be in store from Argentine soccer coach Diego Maradona. He's always been a character, and he's been true to form in South Africa: His emotional leadership has been an exciting part of the 2010 World Cup.
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