[JesikaFlpk]

Caged : Drug Gang Parrot Lorenzo The Lookout

11:05am Saturday September 18, 2010
Adam Brown

A parrot that Colombian police claim was trained to act as a lookout for a drugs gang has been caged in the Caribbean coastal city of Barranquilla.

Police Commander Fredy Veloza said Lorenzo had been taught to squawk a warning as security forces approached. "We have a parrot that, as soon as the police arrived to the street in Barranquillita, the parrot alerted the people who were there by yelling, 'Run! Run!' so the people would run away," he said.

Despite Lorenzo's alarm call, police detained two suspected drug traffickers and seized weapons, a stash of marijuana and two other birds. The birds were handed over to animal officials who said they have been given more than 1,000 birds trained as lookouts. For decades, drug cartels have used Barranquilla as a staging area to smuggle illicit drugs north to the US.