Pubdate: Sat, 02 Dec 2000
Source: Corpus Christi Caller-Times (TX)
Copyright: 2000 Corpus Christi Caller-Times
Address: P.O. Box 9136, Corpus Christi, TX 78469-9136
Feedback: http://www.caller.com/commcentral/email_ed.htm
Website: http://www.caller.com/
Author: Jeremy Schwartz, Caller-Times

$78 MILLION IN COCAINE SEIZED IN FALFURRIAS

2,445-Pound Load Is Largest Seizure Ever At Checkpoint

U.S. Border Patrol agents made a record-breaking $78 million cocaine
bust Thursday night and arrested a 35-year-old Laredo man who tried to
drive his 18-wheeler out of the Falfurrias checkpoint before agents
could search it.

The seizure was the largest ever at the Falfurrias checkpoint, the
nation's most productive off-border checkpoint in terms of illegal
drug seizures.

Eligio Pena, assistant-agent-in-charge of the Falfurrias checkpoint,
said the man appeared nervous when he pulled into the checkpoint. When
agents directed him to secondary traffic lane, he drove away.

"We chased him down," Pena said. "He said he thought we were telling
him he could go through."

The man was caught about a mile north of the checkpoint on U.S.
Highway 77 and brought back to the checkpoint. There, drug dog Rakker
sniffed out the cocaine.

Pena said the 2,445 pounds of cocaine were headed for Pittsburgh,
Pa.

The driver of the truck, a Mexican citizen living in Laredo, was
turned over to the Corpus Christi office of the U.S. Drug Enforcement
Administration.

Police officials in Pittsburgh were excited when they learned of the
seizure.

"It's going to have a tremendous impact," said Sgt. Ron May of the
Pittsburgh Police Department.

May said that any time the supply of drugs is squeezed the street
price tends to rise.

The cocaine was packaged in vacuum-sealed food bags and placed in
cardboard boxes scattered among boxes of clothes.

"They figured the dog wouldn't smell it," Pena said.

Pena said the drug smugglers may have mistakenly thought the
checkpoint was closed Thursday night because of unusually foggy conditions.

The year's previous record came in June when agents in Falfurrias
found 1,675 pounds of cocaine, worth $53 million, in an 18-wheeler
hauling steel plates.

In 1995, Falfurrias agents seized $74.5 million, or 2,330 pounds, of
cocaine in a tractor-trailer carrying iced-down cucumbers.

The cocaine bust was the second big bust in Falfurrias Thursday night.
A few hours earlier, agents found 1,593 pounds of marijuana in a
tractor-trailer filled with cucumbers driven by a 50-year-old man from
Chicago.

The marijuana, worth $1.2 million, was found in a false floor built
into the trailer.

The $78 million cocaine seizure doubled the checkpoint's November
cocaine total.
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