Pubdate: Fri, 21 Sep 2001
Source: Dallas Morning News (TX)
Copyright: 2001 The Dallas Morning News
Contact:  http://www.dallasnews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/117
Author: Ricardo Sandoval

DRUG ACTIVITY GRINDS TO HALT AT U.S.-MEXICO BORDER

Tighter Security At Checkpoints After Terrorist Attacks Puts 
Traffickers In A Bind

MEXICO CITY - Mexican traffickers have all but frozen daily shipments 
of illegal drugs across the U.S.-Mexico border amid a massive buildup 
of U.S. Customs Service inspectors and National Guard troops.

Daily drug seizures along the Mexican border have dropped to almost 
zero since last week's terrorist attacks in New York and Washington, 
Mexican and U.S. law enforcement officials said Thursday.

That's a direct result of U.S. authorities searching almost every 
passenger and commercial vehicle crossing the border, U.S. Customs 
Service officials said.

"[Traffickers] watch us very closely, so they know we are now on a 
very tough security footing," said Customs Service spokesman Dean 
Boyd. "If I were a smuggler, I would not want to be trying to send 
anything illegal across the border right now."

The growing stockpiles of illegal drugs waiting to be shipped across 
the border into the United States could soon start affecting the 
street price of cocaine, heroin and marijuana, Mexican authorities 
said.

"How long they can hold shipments is a good question," Mr. Boyd said. 
"These guys have bills to pay, too, so they must be getting anxious."

While it's too soon to quantify the slowdown, Mexican authorities 
along the border and in Mexico City said they've noticed a reduction 
in drug-related activity, primarily in the busy Tijuana-San Diego 
border region. That area supplies a majority of the cocaine, heroin, 
marijuana and methamphetamines sold on the streets of the western 
United States, through the powerful Arellano-F=C8lix drug organization.

Almost two-thirds of the cocaine sold in the United States is 
smuggled across the U.S.-Mexico border.

On a normal day - before the terrorist alert - U.S. officials capture 
up to 20 vehicle shipments of drugs in San Diego and El Paso, which 
together record as many as 75,000 vehicle crossings each day. One or 
two loads a day have been seized in the last week, Customs Service 
officials said.

Activity at other busy drug trafficking spots in Mexico has slowed, 
Mexican officials added. At the Tijuana International Airport, for 
example, there have been only two seizures since Sept. 11 - for small 
amounts of heroin. Before the terrorist strike, Mexican police said 
there was a significant confiscation almost every other day.

"It seems as though the drug dealers don't want to risk seizures of 
their products with all this extra police activity," said a Mexican 
federal prosecutor in Tijuana.

The last time the border was this tight was shortly before Jan. 1, 
2000, when U.S. officials went on a so-called "Level One" alert after 
the arrest of a suspected terrorist who attempted to cross from 
Canada to Washington state with explosive materials. But that 
lockdown was short-lived, and officials did not have time to register 
its impact on drug activity.

The current crawl at major border crossings - up to four-hour waits 
for vehicle crossings into Texas at various times of the day - 
reminds officials of the Customs Service crackdown in 1984, after the 
murder of U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent Enrique Camarena 
by Mexican drug traffickers.

With this week's crackdown - National Guard units are supporting 
hundreds of extra Customs Service agents patrolling the Mexican and 
Canadian borders and major airports - criminal activity is down 
across the board in Tijuana.

One trafficker was arrested Wednesday carrying tablets of the drug 
"ecstasy," a local prosecutor said. But Tijuana's usually vibrant and 
often illicit nightlife has come to a grinding halt.
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