By Kathianne Boniello
Police got more than they bargained for Sunday night in Douglaston when they found an Astoria man with $5 million worth of cocaine in his minivan, authorities said.
Queens detectives were in the area of the Douglaston Plaza Shopping Center this weekend investigating a robbery pattern, police said, when they claimed they witnessed Carlos Ospina, 32, of 25-98 36th St. in Astoria, acting suspiciously in the parking lot.
Although police did not describe Ospina’s questionable behavior at a Monday evening news conference, authorities said the detectives began a brief investigation of the man and his 2000 Dodge Caravan, where they found three cabbage boxes filled with 100 kilos of cocaine.
The cocaine has a street value of about $5 million, police said.
Ospina was arrested at about 9 p.m. Sunday, police said, and a spokeswoman for the Office of Special Narcotics said the Astoria resident was scheduled to be arraigned Tuesday and indicted Friday on charges of criminal possession of a controlled substance in the first and third degrees.
The spokeswoman, Magda Gandasegui, said Ospina faces the top sentence of 25 years to life on the first degree charge, which is an A1 felony. Gandasegui said the Office of Special Narcotics, which was established in 1971 and has citywide jurisdiction to investigate and prosecute felony law narcotics violators, has asked that Ospina be held without bail.
According to a criminal complaint provided by the Office of Special Narcotics, detectives were alerted to Ospina’s behavior after watching him drive the van in the parking lot and then leave the vehicle before they found and removed the three drug-filled cabbage boxes.
The cabbage boxes were “packaging which is characteristic of this type of drug,” the complaint said.
Although Sunday’s drug arrest was unexpected, it was the second major narcotics bust in the quiet, well-to-do neighborhood of Douglaston in less than a year.
In May, Brooklyn narcotics detectives raided a house in Douglas Manor, shutting down a high-tech, high-potency marijuana farm police said was used to grow more than $1.5 million of pot. Two people were arrested in the case and pleaded innocent to the charges in July, the Queens district attorney’s office said.
Reach reporter Kathianne Boniello by e-mail at Timesledger@aol.com or call 229-0300, Ext. 157.
