Brussels drugs raid reveals trove of tarantulas, scorpions

BRUSSELS (AP) — Belgian police searching for drugs in a Brussels apartment have discovered 37 cannabis plants — as well as a collection of dozens of poisonous spiders, scorpions and desert-dwelling lizards.

Prosecutors said Friday that two men arrested in the apartment during the raid are being investigated for animal welfare violations, in addition to facing drug-related charges.

Police made the unexpected discovery Wednesday after they were told a strong cannabis smell was coming from a building in a northeast neighborhood of Belgium’s capital.

Officers searched an apartment where a father and his adult son were arrested. In addition to the cannabis plants and 228 grams of marijuana they seized, police found 52 tarantulas, a python, three scorpions, four turtles, two lizards in the Pogona family — also known as bearded dragons — and 16 beetles.