Wild Boars Snort $22K Worth of Cocaine Stashed in Forest

Drug dealers in Italy are counting their losses after a pack of wild boars helped themselves to their stash of cocaine.

The hogs dug up and destroyed $22,000 worth of the drug after finding it buried in a forest in Tuscany.

Police learned of the heist after tapping the phones of a suspected criminal gang -- made up of one Italian and three Albanians -- where they recorded the dealers complaining that the coke had been "hogged".

The tapes feature one of the dealers furiously telling another that the drugs had been ruined, The Telegraph reported.

Using their powerful tusks, the animals had managed to bust through the waterproof packaging and scatter the narcotic all over the forest floor.

It is not known how much of the drug the boars ingested, nor what effect it had on them.

All four alleged members of the gang were subsequently arrested on charges of drug trafficking; investigators claim they were selling 2kg of cocaine every month in the surrounding bars and nightclubs, at around $100 per gram.

Two of the men were jailed, while two were placed under house arrest.

The investigation stemmed from the murder of another suspected Albanian drug dealer by an Italian last year.

Wild boars are widespread in many regions of Italy, and are considered something of a pest.

Farmers frequently complain about them destroying crops and vineyards, while they are estimated to cause as many as 10,000 road accidents per year.

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