WATER RAT

Submarine Smuggler Who Slipped Feds Found in Detroit River: Court Docs

Glen Richard Mousseau is said to have told investigators he “directs a smuggling organization that moves money and narcotics between Canada and the United States.”

A Canadian man was fished out of the Detroit River on Friday—unconscious and tied to two bundles that contained more than 250 pounds of marijuana.

It didn’t take officials long to figure out who he was: He had been arrested a month earlier, admitted he used a submarine to smuggle drugs between Canada and the U.S., and agreed to work for the feds.

That’s according to a Department of Homeland Security affidavit filed with a complaint charging Glen Richard Mousseau with drug dealing, cash smuggling, and entering the U.S. illegally.

The story begins on May 10 when a Michigan sheriff stopped a U-Haul truck near the Canadian border and found Mousseau in the driver’s seat and nearly $100,000 in cash in a plastic container.

Although Mousseau initially denied the money was his, when investigators from Homeland Security Investigations showed up, “he stated that he directs a smuggling organization that moves money and narcotics between Canada and the United States,” the affidavit said.

Rise of the Narco Subs

Avi Jorisch

He allegedly told them he was the owner of a submarine that had been seized by authorities a few weeks earlier that he used to ferry the contraband across the river. And, he agreed to stay in town, at the Baymont Hotel in Flat Rock, and cooperate.

According to the affidavit, 11 days after his arrest, Mousseau told Homeland Security that he could provide them with information about a methamphetamine shipment arriving the next day.

Then, in the dead of night, he bolted from the hotel—telling the clerk he had an emergency funeral to attend, the feds said. He left behind a suitcase that contained five cellphones and a laptop, a dry suit used by scuba divers, and Canadian identity papers that had been stolen from someone else in a break-in.

Two weeks went by with no word from Mousseau. Then in the wee hours of Friday, Border Patrol agents spotted a vessel cross the international boundary. As they tried to stop it, they saw two large bundles tossed into the water—and when they went to investigate the bundles, they found Mousseau in the water, connected to the packages by a tow strap.

Mousseau is due in court for a detention hearing next week. His court-appointed attorney did not respond to a request for comment from the Detroit News, which first reported his arrest.

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