Just when you think the news couldn’t get any weirder, Alberto Hernandez Castillo walked into the airport with birds in his pants. Or given his condition, perhaps he waddled.
Hernandez Castillo was stopped while going through customs at the Miami International Airport after arriving from Havana. He was selected for a secondary inspection and told U.S. Customs and Border Control that he was not, emphasis on not, bringing any wildlife or animals into the country.
But agents thought he looked a little nervous. And, excuse our language, they noticed “an unexplained bulge on the front of Hernandez Castillo’s pelvis/waist area.”
Pulling Hernandez Castillo aside for a pat-down, agents discovered the cause of the prominent lump: plastic tubes containing live birds were sewn into his underwear.
Ten birds — eight yellow-faced grassquits and two blue grosbeaks — had somehow survived the journey tucked in his unmentionables.
While the birds were safely removed from the tubes, Hernandez Castillo was charged with smuggling goods into the U.S. and is due back in court Oct. 26.
Talk about a bird-brained idea.