Customs officials in St. Barts inspected Jeff Bezos' superyacht on New Year's Eve. The three-hour search was routine, according to Page Six.
Bezos was apparently not present. Aboard the craft were his fiancée, Lauren Sánchez, and her ex-boyfriend, former NFL star Tony Gonzalez, the father of one of her children. St. Barts is a French-speaking Caribbean island.
Visitors cannot have more than €10,000 ($10,498) in cash, Glass Almanac reported. This is to prevent money laundering and drug trafficking, especially cocaine.
"Customs officials often conduct thorough checks on yachts arriving in the region to ensure compliance with these regulations," the publication stated. "In Bezos' case, the authorities likely initiated the search as part of their standard protocol, ensuring that all financial transactions aboard the vessel were transparent and lawful."
The 127-meter yacht (417 feet), which has three 70-meter masts, has drawn the ire of officials as well as average people.
Just months ago, it was involved in a high-profile illegal timber case. The builder, Oceanco, was fined €150,000 by the Netherlands Public Prosecution Service for using teak from Myanmar to construct the decks, furniture, and furnishings. The country's military dictatorship uses the timber trade to fund its deadly reign.
When the behemoth was complete, residents of Rotterdam, Netherlands, were outraged that a historic bridge would need to be dismantled for the ship to reach the sea. It turned out that the yacht could fit under the bridge without its masts, but Oceanco took an alternate route anyway — in the middle of the night.
The boat cost $500 million and is often followed by another yacht owned by Bezos. The second-richest man in the world founded consumer giant Amazon.
His and other billionaires' exploits are among the largest contributors to planet-warming gases in the atmosphere. Their yachts, private jets, and even investments are wreaking havoc by "fueling inequality, hunger and … threatening lives," Oxfam executive director Amitabh Behar said, per Common Dreams.
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