Pubdate: Mon, 29 Jan 2001
Source: Contra Costa Times (CA)
Copyright: 2001 Contra Costa Newspapers Inc.
Address: 2640 Shadelands Drive, Walnut Creek, CA 94598
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Website: http://www.contracostatimes.com/
Forum:  Ben Fox, Associated Press

DRUG TRAFFICKERS SHIFT TO PACIFIC

SAN DIEGO -- A 40-foot motorboat headed north in the Pacific Ocean off 
Central America, about 200 miles from land. That was enough to raise suspicion.

"There's no reason to go out that far to fish," said Lt. Cmdr. Mike 
Sabellico of the U.S. Coast Guard in San Diego. "Normally, that means 
they're involved in something illegal."

In this case, it was hauling more than 1,600 pounds of cocaine destined for 
the United States, according to Coast Guard officials.

Two hours after a patrol plane spotted the boat, a U.S. Navy frigate, with 
sailors and Coast Guard personnel on board, stopped the vessel by firing 15 
warning shots from a .50-caliber machine gun.

The drug seizure and arrest of seven men off Panama last month was the most 
recent example of what U.S. authorities say is a major shift in drug 
trafficking to a vast ocean territory stretching from South America to 
California.

More than 80 percent of the 126,000 pounds of cocaine seized by the Coast 
Guard in the 2000 fiscal year came from vessels in the eastern Pacific 
Ocean, up from 38 percent in 1999.

In the current federal fiscal year, which began Oct. 1, the cocaine seized 
in the region so far makes up 95 percent of the total, 20,500 pounds.

Authorities now believe about half of all cocaine bound for the United 
States is smuggled from Colombia through the eastern Pacific as traffickers 
avoid the traditional Caribbean route.

A major factor in the shift is increased law enforcement patrols in the 
Caribbean, said Coast Guard Capt. Jeffrey Hathaway, who is part of a 
federal drug task force that includes the Customs Service, Department of 
Defense, Drug Enforcement Administration and other agencies.

The shift also is driven by the smugglers' realization that the vastness of 
the eastern Pacific smuggling region, an area nearly the size of the 
continental United States, makes it hard to get caught, Hathaway said.

Traffickers based in Colombia use fast-moving motorboats with two or three 
outboard engines, loaded with drugs and extra gas, to reach the southwest 
coast of Mexico in about two days. They rely on fishing boats scattered 
along the route to refuel.

 From Mexico, most of the cocaine is smuggled over land into the United 
States, officials said. Some of it also is transferred into smaller boats 
that try to sail directly into U.S. ports.

Navy and Coast Guard ships and aircraft patrol international waters. Closer 
to shore, Customs and Border Patrol officials monitor harbors and bays 
around California and Texas.

United Nations agreements and binational accords between individual nations 
authorize U.S. authorities to arrest and prosecute traffickers caught in 
international waters.

But the U.S. military is prohibited from law enforcement activities. The 
Coast Guard, which is not part of the Defense Department, faces no such 
restriction.

At sea, the traffickers benefit from a region with few natural bottlenecks 
for boat traffic. Closer to home, those smugglers who try to make it the 
last mile into the United States can hide among the thousands of pleasure 
boats and legitimate fishing and tour vessels.

"People don't think there's much of a problem on the West Coast, but 
they're wrong," said Max Chandler, a Customs marine enforcement officer in 
San Diego. "We've got a huge problem."

Federal agencies have transferred an undisclosed number of agents from the 
Caribbean to the Pacific, and the result has been a string of arrests and 
seizures over the past year.

Among the largest catches was the seizure off Panama in September of 5,300 
pounds of cocaine, with a street value of $530 million. Alongside the 
motorboat carrying the drugs was a 72-foot Colombian fishing vessel, which 
was allegedly used to refuel smaller smuggling boats.

A low-level crew member on such a venture might earn $1,000; a captain 
might receive $50,000 or more, authorities said. But the wages vary widely.

In December, a 49-year-old U.S. citizen arrested by Customs entering San 
Diego harbor with 600 pounds of marijuana from Mexico in his sailboat told 
authorities he was paid $12,800, court records show. It was his fifth trip 
in two weeks.

But the penalties also can be substantial. The 12 Colombians arrested in 
international waters off Panama in September face a minimum mandatory 
sentence of 10 years and a maximum of life in prison, according to the 
federal prosecutor in that case, assistant U.S. attorney Bill Gallo.

If the past is any gauge, the drug trafficking in the eastern Pacific is 
likely to taper off as U.S. authorities become more adept at catching the 
smugglers, Gallo said.

"It's just like a chess game," he said. "They make a move, and we make a 
countermove."
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