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Teddy bears found stuffed with $33 million in heroin

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Filed under: Entrepreneurship, Fraud

The teddy bears may have looked cuddly and sweet, but what cops found stuffed inside was a bitter pill to swallow. Drug Enforcement Administration officials busted a crew of drug dealers who were smuggling heroin using the popular Build-A-Bear toys. The drug bust at an apartment in the Bronx in New York City turned up a bunch of the toys stuffed with about 33 pounds of heroin. The drugs, marked with names like Swine Flu, Crime 360 and Barack Obama, were valued at about $33 million.

Twelve people were arrested after a three-month investigation. The drug dealers had stuffed square-inch dime bags of heroin in the bears so they could be transported without being detected. Neighbors who lived in the building expressed surprise that the apartment was being used for drugs.




It doesn't appear that any Build-A-Bear stores were involved in the drug trafficking, but being associated with such a story must be a public relations nightmare for the company.

A spokeswoman for the company told CNBC, "Although our name was included in the story, this is clearly not about our product or our stores."

Part of the fun of going to a Build-A-Bear store is the whole process of picking out a new furry friend, placing a little red heart inside, and filling it with stuffing. Using children's toys to smuggle drugs is despicable and shows that drug dealers will do just about anything to turn a profit.

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