Earlier this week in Lima, Peruvian police disguised members of the Green Squad as World Cup mascots, broke through a gate and arrested a suspect during a drugs raid, authorities said.
Colonel Carlos Fredy Alcántara Obregón, who described the intelligence behind the operation, said the team concluded the man was a “die-hard football fan” and staged the costume approach to avoid alerting him. "So we proceeded to disguise my Green Squad personnel as World Cup mascots in order to approach him without arousing suspicion and make the arrest," Alcántara said.
The officers used two of this year’s tournament mascots — Clutch the Bald Eagle, representing the United States, and Maple the Moose, representing Canada — to get close to the target. The other mascot, Zayu the Jaguar, was not part of the operation because, authorities noted, he does not work Wednesdays.
The use of the mascots was tactical: Alcántara told reporters the disguises let officers move in without triggering the suspect’s suspicions, a decision the colonel linked directly to their prior intelligence work. The raid culminated when officers forced entry through a gate and took the suspect into custody; officials have released no details on what drugs, if any, were seized or on specific charges.
The stunt has a clear friction point. The characters used are fictional tournament mascots tied to this year’s World Cup, and the spectacle has prompted commentary noting that the costumes—while effective as a ruse—are not actual people authorized to work in Peru. The incongruity of law enforcement borrowing fictional brand characters for an arrest has amplified attention to the case.
The operation landed in public feeds alongside routine tournament coverage; posts about the raid have circulated next to searches for world cup scores today as fans track matches. Whether that attention will translate into scrutiny of police procedure or the opening of a formal inquiry remains to be seen.
What is not clear — and the immediate gap in the record — is what, if anything, was recovered during the raid and what criminal counts the suspect will face. Prosecutors and police have not issued a follow-up statement detailing seizures, charges or the next legal steps, leaving the core outcome of the drugs investigation unresolved.
