Munich (dpa / lby) - More than 70 kilograms of banned fireworks were found by customs officials in the Upper Palatinate in four cars. Two people initially claimed they were not carrying any illegal items, police reported on Friday. According to this, a man “apparently could not remember the approximately 17 kilograms of fireworks” that were in his trunk during the control near Waidhaus (Neustadt an der Waldnaab district). At Pfreimd (Schwandorf district), the customs officers found a woman weighing 23 kilos - packed in garbage bags.
The officials discovered 29 kilograms and 3 kilograms of illegal pyrotechnics in two other men, it was said. The Waidhauser officials thus confiscated a total of almost 72 kilos on the last Sunday in October. The smugglers are now being investigated for violating the Explosives Act.
Customs not only find illegal fireworks towards the end of the year. That happens all year round, "if someone thinks they have to celebrate their 100th or 50th birthday," said a police spokesman.
