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A Woman in China Got Busted Smuggling 102 iPhones Strapped to Her Belly

Customs agents stopped her when they noticed some weird, probably rectangular bulges under her thick clothes.
Photo via XMNN

Customs officials in Shenzhen, China, arrested a woman earlier this month after discovering that she had 102 iPhones illegally strapped to her torso, the Verge reports.

The woman was apparently trying to sneak all 40 pounds of phones from Hong Kong into mainland China where steep taxes on Apple products can jack up the price of an iPhone by 30 percent more than in Hong Kong, according to the Verge.

Officials pulled her aside when they noticed weird, probably rectangular bulges under her clothes—clothes that were also suspiciously thick for the summertime. When they searched her, they wound up peeling her like an iPhone onion, uncovering layers upon layers of devices wrapped around her belly, along with some fancy-ass watches thrown in for good measure.

Mainland China has been battling iPhone smugglers who try to dodge the tax for a while now, but usually the housewives who are paid a few bucks to slip an iPad home from Hong Kong stick to a single device. Trying to strap more than 100 to your stomach is a little trickier.

According to 9to5Mac, 102 iPhones is a pretty big haul, but it doesn't top the guy who was caught trying to get a whopping 146 Apple devices into the country back in 2015.

Maybe the lesson here is for would-be smugglers to take a couple trips and split up the load next time. Or they could just build a giant catapult and fling some phones from the island, like those weed smugglers in Mexico.