Tarantulas, laser pointers and cannabis pipes: How ICA weeds out illegal stuff in the mail

SINGAPORE: Deep in the bowels of the Singapore Post Centre in Paya Lebar, Checkpoint Inspector 1 (CI1) Mohammad Rizal Mohamed Kassim sat in a roller chair, his eyes glued to two screens connected to an X-ray machine.

On a conveyor belt running through the machine were parcels and packets of mail, matched by fuzzy patches of orange and blue rolling across the screens. His eyes zoomed in on one particular image.

It showed a kind of semi-metallic lump, with a hollow tube running through it. “I found it strange, so I flagged the item for more thorough checks,” the 36-year-old Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) officer told CNA last Thursday (Sep 26) of the incident, which happened three days earlier.

A SingPost staff member pulled the package off the belt, put on blue latex gloves and picked up an orange penknife. He sliced open the package gently, emptying its contents on a table for CI1 Rizal to scrutinise.

This item looked like a piece of stone, but he knew stones don’t have openings on both sides. “I realised that this could possibly be drug paraphernalia, because its functionalities mimic other conventional drug-taking utensils,” he said, noting that it could be a pipe used to smoke cannabis.

An ICA officer holding a clipboard recorded details of the package, including its addressee and the item detected. They referred it to the Central Narcotics Bureau (CNB), which determined that it was indeed drug paraphernalia. The CNB is conducting further investigations.

“This could be a new modus operandi for smuggling in drug-taking utensils,” CI1 Rizal added, stating that it was different from the usual paraphernalia made of glass.

CI1 Rizal works at the parcel post section, a small area cordoned off with yellow barricades where ICA officers screen up to 20,000 postal articles for dangerous and prohibited items every day.

It is a small cog in SingPost’s double-floor mail processing centre, a cavernous space the size of two football fields where machines automatically sort and distribute millions of packages each year.

But it sits on the frontline of Singapore’s borders, securing the country against contraband like drugs, weapons and explosives.

According to ICA figures, the total number of articles cleared at the parcel post section each year has gone up from 5.2 million in 2016 to 6.1 million in 2018. In the same period, contraband cases detected annually increased from about 14,000 to almost 17,000.

On Sep 10, CNB announced that it had seized two pots of cannabis plants from a flat in Yishun after ICA officers at the parcel post section discovered glass apparatus suspected to be used for smoking drugs. The next day, a 44-year-old Singaporean man was charged with cultivating a Class A controlled drug.

CRITTERS IN THE MAIL

When CNA visited the parcel post section on Thursday, ICA officers had earlier in the morning detected a bottle of cannabidiol oil. Following previous detections of the controlled substance in the mail, CNB had shared with ICA some common traits of these bottles.

So in this case, X-ray images of the bottle quickly aroused officers’ suspicions, which increased when the package was declared as “fragrance oil”. The oil turned out to be odourless, and the “hemp extract” description on the bottle gave it away.

Prohibited items found in the mail include duty-unpaid liquor, airsoft guns, high-power laser pointers and live animals like geckos and tarantulas. A whole family of the spiders were found last year in clear containers declared as toys.

On Thursday, officers suspected that they had found chewing tobacco after seeing a lump of organic material in a package.

“Don’t worry, there’s no spider inside,” one ICA officer joked as SingPost staff gingerly opened the package, drawing laughter. The substance was confirmed to be snus, a type of chewing tobacco, and the case was referred to the Health Sciences Authority.

It’s just another day on the job for CI1 Rizal, who has sniffed out about 500 contraband items in the six months he’s been posted to the parcel post section. The most common are duty-unpaid cigars, which he said appear so frequently that even SingPost staff know what their packages look like.

MASTERING THE X-RAY

Still, CI1 Rizal said he and his colleagues rely on lots of “skills and experience” in the job.

They look out for tell-tale signs like anomalies in the shape and density of common objects. This requires knowing what a wide range of these items should look like, so anything different – including a button on a pen – arouses suspicion.

For instance, CI1 Rizal highlighted that an abnormally hollow Bluetooth device could be used to conceal drugs, as he noted how the rise of e-commerce has allowed smugglers to exploit everyday items like small furniture or household goods.

This also means that officers have to quickly make sense of the X-ray images: Orange means the item has a more organic composition; blue means it’s more metallic. And the darker the shade of colour, the denser the material is.

To the untrained eye, an image could well look like long, blue squiggly lines, but an ICA officer confidently pointed out that they were likely metal wires. “It’s how you decipher an object from a simple colour scheme,” CI1 Rizal said.

Once an ICA officer orders a parcel off the belt, the next step is to check the description on it. Something overly generic, like “hardware accessories”, would ring the alarm bells.

The final step is to open up the parcel and definitively confirm what the suspected item is, especially if it requires further testing. Officers use portable devices and swabs which can detect narcotics, radiation, explosives and chemical warfare agents.

While the technology helps, CI1 Rizal said the human element of the screening process remains key, adding that working in tandem has led to a consistently large amount of detections.

WORKING WITH AGENCIES

Packages which are confirmed to contain prohibited items are then sealed and handed over to the relevant agencies for further investigations.

For example, plant seeds are sent to the National Parks Board, laser pointers to the National Environment Agency and airsoft guns to the police. These agencies can also determine if the smuggled item is part of a larger consignment brought in by a syndicate.

For his part, CI1 Rizal has detected multiple instances of the same prohibited item over a short period of time, but he believes they were more a case of blind perseverance. “They will try their luck, only for the item to be detained over and over again,” he said.

The ICA also uses intelligence from other agencies to preempt the detection of prohibited items. This is when the authority works with SingPost to look out for mail with specific names or addresses.

Beyond that, it participates in regular sharing sessions with other agencies – like in the case of cannabidiol oil – on how local and foreign smugglers operate.

OVERCOMING MONOTONY

But the job has its challenges too.

ICA officers watching the screens only work for 30 to 45 minutes before swapping with a partner to prevent visual fatigue from screening the sheer amount of mail.

CNA observed that things could get pretty routine, as officers stared at the screens in a never-ending cycle. All this amid a constant drone of the conveyor belt, dull thud of packages bunching up, and steady shuffle of SingPost staff scooping them up.

“You basically look out for each other,” CI1 Rizal said. “When it gets a bit too monotonous, we will swap accordingly. This is to make sure we have a high level of concentration in order to detect any suspicious indicators.”

Screening officers should also keep a “clear and neutral” mind while screening. “If you are too fixated on looking for, for example, a laser pointer, then you will always think of a particular shape or density,” he said. “So, you will never be able to find other things.”

Therefore it is important for officers to always maintain a sense of “curiosity” while looking at the thousands of images and making split-second decisions. “You will always need to question yourself,” he added. “If it’s not ordinary, you should flag it for further checks.”

However it doesn’t always work out.

On Thursday, ICA officers flagged a package declared as “home and garden” which contained what looked like plant seeds, but were later confirmed to be foam sponges. SingPost staff resealed the package and returned it to the belt.

The initial suspicion could have been based on the porous nature of the sponges, which looked like they had harboured seeds.

MAIL WAITS FOR NO ONE

Besides playing the guessing game, officers have to contend with extended hours on the job.

They work weekdays from 8am to 4pm, with a lunch break at noon. But they put in extra hours when the volume of mail increases, including taking turns to have lunch or skipping lunch completely. They were recently called back for the National Day and Hari Raya Haji long weekend. And the year-end holiday season is especially hectic.

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It is a demanding role, but CI1 Rizal assured that new officers get mentors so they can learn on the job. “Every day is a new day,” he said. “So like a sponge you have to absorb as much as possible on the go, then you will be able to apply your experience.”

Not that CI1 Rizal is complaining. As an ICA officer, he previously worked at the land checkpoints clearing cargo permits, a more administrative job that involves handling documents and paperwork. He’s very clear about which role he favours.

“I prefer to detect as many contraband cases as possible,” he stated without hesitation. “I’m the kind of person who would always want to push myself further.

“I feel a sense of fulfilment when I am able to play my part in preventing security-sensitive materials from being smuggled into Singapore, which could have serious repercussions for society.”