News-Sentinel.com

Thursday, 03/18/1999

NAFTA

Border agents brace for influx of illegal goods

Drug traffic likely will rise when trade restrictions ease.

By DEBORAH MARTINEZ of Southwest Texas State University



News-Sentinel photo by C. Somodevilla
Sniffing out trouble US. Border Patrol agent Oziel Puente searches a truck with the help of Kelly, a German shephe-rd dog trained to sniff out drugs. The checkpoint at Falfurrias, Texas, where -Puente works, stops all northbound traffic on highway 281. This checkpoing finds and confiscates more drugs than any other in the United States.

McALLEN, Texas — Drug smugglers. Overloaded trucks. Illegal immigrants. These problems overwhelm federal border patrol and immigration agents in South Texas border regions.

Managing them — especially illegal immigration — has proved nearly impossible, according to a 1998 study by the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts.

The North American Free Trade Agreement and the NAFTA highway could escalate problems.

Beginning in January 2000, NAFTA will allow trucks transporting goods from Mexico's businesses and maquiladoras to travel deeper into the United States. With many could come illegal drugs, illegal immigrants and dangerous commercial trucks that could endanger American lives.

To prepare for the increase in traffic, the 1,000 U.S. Border Patrol agents assigned to Southwest Texas have stepped up their use of K-9s to sniff for drugs and ferret out illegal immigrants.

"On my level, if we get an increase in 18-wheelers, there can be some problems there," said Agent Ricardo Lopez, an 11-year veteran who works at the Sarita checkpoint on U.S. 77.

Agents formerly used K-9s to sniff cars for drugs occasionally. Last year, canines were put on duty around the clock, said Letty Garza, spokesperson for the Border Patrol's McAllen sector.

"You can't go wrong with the dogs," Garza said. "These dogs will smell anything. We've seen an increase in drug seizures."

Border Patrol agents in South Texas said drug traffic between the United States and Mexico has been escalating since at least the beginning of this decade, well before NAFTA went into effect in 1994.

"There has probably been something like a 20 percent increase (in drug seizures) over the past seven years I've been here," said Gilbert Gonzales, an agent at the Border Patrol's Encino/Falfurrias checkpoint, located on U.S. 281.

"It's been real steady."

The highest number of drug confiscations come around October, when Mexico's marijuana harvest is in full swing, Garza said. Cocaine is the second most popular smuggled drug.

In 1994 the Drug Enforcement Administration designated the Southwest Border Region, extending from San Diego to Brownsville, as a High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, according to the comptroller.

The U.S. government suggested that drug profits of $50 billion a year — $6 billion more than was appropriated in fiscal 1998 for Texas state government — flowed through Texas into Mexico, the comptroller said.

"Money going out is a natural reaction to drugs coming in," one special agent told a Texas newspaper reporter.

The comptroller's report notes that Mexico has become a major money-laundering center. Money laundering is the practice of taking illicit income and "cleaning" it by running it through legitimate businesses. More than $53 million in cash was seized by U.S. Customs agents at border-area checkpoints between 1994 and 1996, the Texas comptroller report said.

Additionally, arrests are up, but a higher percentage is being disposed in Texas courtrooms through deferred adjudication, meaning offenders are not sent to jail.

Although the increase in drug arrests may be because more people are smuggling narcotics, said Garza, the rise is also a result of Border Patrol agents' diligence.

In addition to dogs, agents also use physical searches and X-ray machines to inspect commercial trucks. Companies are also being asked to police their own trucks and warehouses.

The McAllen Border Patrol sector is the second-largest in the nation. At this checkpoint, inspections are more thorough and agents are better trained. But even faced with a post armed with K-9s and better trained agents, drugs are smuggled through.

"I don't even guess as to how much gets by," said Gonzales.

At the Encino/Falfurrias checkpoint, agents make more drug busts than at any other point in the nation. But still, they make little headway in drug trafficking that may get worse.

"I'd say we probably get every one or two cases per eight that get by. The dogs, they get tired. They don't do their job after a while," Gonzales said.

Enforcement resources

Between 1993 and 1997, Border Patrol officers nearly doubled from 3,400 to more than 6,000. The Immigration and Naturalization fiscal year 1999 budget is $4.2 billion, and the number of Border Patrol agents is expected to nearly double again over the next three years.
According to a 1994 study by the Urban Institute, only four out of 10 people illegally present in the United States entered by crossing the Mexico border. Yet, at the time of the study, 85 percent of all enforcement resources were concentrated on that border. Mexican nationals represent only 39 percent of undocumented immigrants in the United States, but they are 90 percent of those arrested by the INS.