Police Search for Missing Cocaine After Ship's 'Bizarre' Journey

The MV Raider was escorted into Sydney Harbour in March after leaving Panama in December.

It all started just before Christmas last year.

The MV Raider, a US-based merchant ship, reappeared after disappearing from shipping tracking websites in 2021.

The boat was in Cristobal, a port town in Panama, Central America.

The MV Raider was now registered under a new flag, the African nation of Togo.

It also had a new destination — Sydney, Australia.

Workers were told the MV Raider was to be delivered to its listed new owner, a Brisbane-based manufacturer called Rosenbauer.

The problem was Rosenbauer had no idea it was coming.

A company representative said, 'We sell big fire trucks.'

The MV Raider was involved in a three-month saga to import cocaine to Australia.

And this week it all came to a head.

Police have charged six crew members with drug smuggling.

The MV Raider was rebuilt to incorporate secret smuggling tunnels.

Six members of its crew were charged with drug trafficking, with police alleging the boat had almost six tonnes of cocaine aboard.

Experts say the journey shows the lengths alleged drug traffickers are going to bring product to Australia.

A 'bizarre' journey

An advertisement was put out on social media for crew to join the MV Raider for a 25-day journey to Australia.

Eleven Honduran and Ecuadorian nationals boarded the boat, and it set off on December 22.

But it never got that far.

On January 16 it was intercepted by French authorities near French Polynesia.

The French Navy seized and dumped 4.8 tonnes of cocaine before releasing the MV Raider and its crew.

The French say 4.8 tonnes of cocaine was found on board, worth about $1.5 billion in the Australian market.

French Polynesian President Moetai Brotherson said 'overcrowded prisons' prevented the French territory from prosecuting the crew.

The MV Raider was released, and the boat and its crew continued on their way.

But unbeknown to the MV Raider crew, the Australian Federal Police's own investigation began.

One tonne of cocaine remained aboard in a smuggling hide deep in the boat's bowels.

One of the secret tunnels police allege was used in the plot to import cocaine.

'This is actually fairly common [with the] lengths that narcotic smugglers go to hide this stuff,' said Jennifer Parker.

At least seven narco subs have been discovered in Pacific waters near Australia in the past 18 months.

Ms Parker said huge financial incentives inspired smugglers to come up with all sorts of 'weird and wonderful ways' to attempt to import product.

'Clearly drug cartels in South America have determined that the market in Oceania, and predominantly the market in Australia, is so lucrative that it's worth their time investing in different ways, different types of vessels and different networks to smuggle these narcotics across the Pacific,' she said.

'Nothing was found'

After the stop in French Polynesia, the MV Raider continued sailing towards Sydney.

But on January 24, after transmitting a distress call for engine repairs, it was escorted into a port in the Cook Islands.

The vessel docked at Avatiu Port in the Cook Islands after entering Rarotonga waters under a distress call for engine repairs.

Cook Islands Customs said border agencies conducted a search following its arrival and 'nothing was found'.

The captain and crew were questioned and allowed to go ashore, under supervision, to obtain 'essential provisions'.

At the time, Australian Federal Police declined to comment on whether they were tracking the vessel or planning to make arrests.

Again the crew and the vessel were released, and from the Cook Islands the MV Raider made its way to Sydney.

On February 19 the MV Raider was 180 nautical miles off the NSW coast, near Wollongong when it was intercepted by NSW Police and Australian Border Force Officers.

Tracking systems located the MV Raider in Australian waters near the NSW coast in late February.

Despite embarking on a two-week journey towards Australia, in an unexpected twist on February 20, when only 150 nautical miles from its intended port of Sydney, the vessel made a quick turn north-east.

It declared its new destination as Noumea, the capital of French territory New Caledonia.

They interviewed the crew and advised them they would not be permitted entry to Australia.

The ABC understands it is alleged that the one tonne of cocaine hidden on the ship was still aboard at that time.

Recent media reports suggest that the AFP received intelligence about suspected additional cocaine aboard, soon after the seizure by French authorities.

It is suggested the AFP allowed the MV Raider to sail unimpeded along Australia's east coast rather than intercept it at the risk of the crew claiming asylum.

In late February ABF officers met the vessel off the NSW coast before the ship diverted to Noumea.

For six days, the MV Raider tracked towards New Caledonia, but on February 26, about 250 nautical miles off the coast of Rockhampton, it once again stopped and did a U-turn back towards Sydney.

In a press release, Australian Federal Police said it suspected an Australian-based crew operating on behalf of 'a larger criminal syndicate' was looking to rendezvous with the MV Raider to conduct an 'at-sea transfer' within Australia's Economic Exclusion Zone.

It says it has evidence alleging six crew members were connected to 'at least one drop-off of drugs within Australia's territorial waters'.

The AFP said it seized a satellite phone allegedly used by senior members of the MV Raider crew to 'communicate with the syndicate's bosses based offshore'.

According, to Ms Parker this is a common strategy.

'They plan to sit off the coast and rendezvous with a smaller vessel to bring those drugs into the country,' she said.

The 'drop off'

With the vessel pointed toward Sydney, on February 26 it lingered off the coast for a week.

The ABC understands this is the time where the AFP alleges the 'drop-off' of the cocaine occurred.

While lingering outside Wollongong for days, the MV Raider then made a mayday call on March 12, with the crew saying they were short of water and food.

The MV Raider made another U-turn towards Australia and issued a distress call on March 12.

Under international law, Australian authorities are obligated to respond.

In its final journey, almost three months after setting out from Panama, the MV Raider was escorted into Snails Bay in Sydney Harbour.

A tugboat escorted the MV Raider into Sydney Harbour to a mooring at Snails Bay.

On March 19, the 11 crew were escorted to immigration detention.

And on March 30, six of the men were charged with drug trafficking.

The ABC understands of the five men who were not charged, three have been deported.

'One remains in Villawood [Detention Centre], last we heard, and there's one that we can't account for,' International Transport Workers' Federation's Ian Bray told the ABC.

Police bagging evidence on the deck of the MV Raider.

Mr Bray said the organisation had been in touch with some of the crew's families in Honduras and Ecuador and the organisation had 'engaged legal representation' to look at the merits of the case.

AFP Commander Brett James said investigations were continuing into what happened to the one tonne of cocaine — and the origin of the drugs — alleged to still be on the boat when it left Cook Islands.

'We will work with our international and domestic law enforcement partners to identify the criminal syndicates — and anyone else — involved in facilitating this alleged cocaine import,' he said.

The six men will reappear in court in May.