PHILADELPHIA — Customs agents in Philadelphia unraveled a scheme to conceal more than 10,000 Xanaz pills hidden inside spools of yarn that arrived in a shipment from the Netherlands.

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According to a news release from U.S. Customs and Border Protection, customs agents seized 10,060 pills that were concealed inside the yarn.

Officers were alerted on April 26 by the agency’s trade enforcement experts at the Baltimore field office. Agents in Baltimore reviewed incoming cargo manifests and suspected that something was wrong with the shipment, the news release stated.

CBP officers in Philadelphia found the shipment the same day while inspecting express consignment parcels that arrived from overseas destinations. When officers detected some abnormalities, they opened the shipment and discovered a dozen spools of yarn that were unusually heavy, according to the news release.

After unraveling the yarn, officers found stacks of 10-pill blister packs of Alprazolam pills taped to the inner spool. Xanax is a known brand name of Alprazolam.

CBP officers then unraveled the yarn which revealed stacks of 10-pill blister packs taped to the inner spool. Officers found 1,006 blister packs with 1 milligram dosages; authorities estimated the street value at $30,000, according to the CBP news release.

The shipment was headed to an address in Brooklyn, New York.

No arrests have been made.

“Transnational criminal organizations take enormous steps to conceal their illicit products hoping to evade detection,” Tater Ortiz, area port director for the Port of Philadelphia, said in a statement. “However, Customs and Border Protection trade experts and officers are exceptionally skilled at identifying potentially anomalous shipments and detecting unique concealment methods.”

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