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Ton Of Marijuana Found In Hot Sauce Shipment At Calif. Border

SAN DIEGO (CBS) — It was definitely a spicy find for U.S. Border Patrol agents: a shipment of hot sauce confiscated at the U.S.- Mexico border was found to contain over one ton of marijuana.

The bust came last Friday afternoon at the cargo checkpoint in Otay Mesa, where customs agents decided to take a closer look at the trailer loaded with what had been reported to be hot sauce.

After a border patrol agent detained the driver — a 39-year-old male Mexican citizen and resident of Tijuana — for secondary screening, officers ran the tractor trailer through the port's x-ray imaging system.

Once they opened the shipment, they found 123 bundles of marijuana among bottles of hot sauce.

Officials said the marijuana has an estimated street value of $1.4 million.

The driver was arrested and transported to the Metropolitan Correctional Center, while agents seized the marijuana, tractor and trailer.

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