Two researchers have been apprehended and charged with a plot to smuggle after being caught at a major airport with vials containing the mpox virus and human DNA. Vincent Munster, 53, and Claude Kwe, 38, were arrested at Detroit Metropolitan Airport in Michigan, USA, earlier this year following an alleged smuggling incident. US authorities reported that the pair, hailing from the Netherlands and Cameroon, were intercepted by Customs and Border Protection (CBP) while transporting a large black plastic case.
Although Munster and Kwe initially claimed the case contained diagnostics and testing equipment, they are now accused of smuggling viral pathogens from an outbreak in the Republic of Congo on a commercial airplane. The US Attorney’s Office of Michigan disclosed that both researchers, affiliated with the National Institutes of Health (NIH) at the Rocky Mountain Laboratory in Montana, arrived in Detroit from Brazzaville, Republic of Congo.
During their stay in the city amidst an Mpox outbreak in 2025, Munster and Kwe, engaged in studying emerging viral pathogens, returned to the US with 113 vials in Styrofoam coolers. Subsequent examinations revealed 17 vials containing deactivated mpox virus, one with chickenpox virus, and two with human DNA. The Attorney General’s office stated that the experts had illicitly transported the pathogens on a commercial airplane from the Congo.
Jennifer Runyan, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI Detroit Field Office, condemned the alleged unlawful smuggling and deception of federal agents by the researchers, emphasizing that no one should consider themselves beyond the law due to their professional standing. The National Institutes of Health has been approached for comment by the Daily Mirror.