Pubdate: Thu, 02 Dec 2010
Source: San Francisco Chronicle (CA)
Copyright: 2010 Hearst Communications Inc.
Contact: http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/submissions/#1
Website: http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/388
Authors: Elliot Spagat, Martha Mendoza
Bookmark: http://mapinc.org/topic/Xcellerator

BIG DEA BUSTS AFFECT CARTELS LITTLE, STUDY SAYS

Calexico, Imperial County -- On a sleepy boulevard of motels and 
fast-food joints near the Mexican border, police stopped a car with a 
broken tail light. In the trunk, an officer found a trash bag 
containing 48 pounds of narcotics, and in the driver's pocket, scraps 
of paper scrawled with phone numbers.

Almost four years later, a grave Eric Holder called his first news 
conference as attorney general and announced where those phone 
numbers had led - to a sweeping investigation called Operation 
Xcellerator, which produced the largest-ever federal crackdown on 
Mexico's Sinaloa drug cartel, with 761 people arrested and 23 tons of 
narcotics seized.

Standing with Holder that day in 2009 was acting Drug Enforcement 
Administration chief Michele Leonhart, who declared: "Today we have 
dealt the Sinaloa drug cartel a crushing blow."

But just how crushing was it? An Associated Press investigation casts 
doubt on whether the crackdown caused any significant setback for the 
cartel. It still ranks near the top of Mexico's drug gangs, and most 
of those arrested were underlings who had little connection to the 
cartel and were swiftly replaced. The cartel leader remains free, 
along with his top commanders.

The findings confirm what many critics of the drug war have said for 
years: The government is quick to boast about large arrests or drug 
seizures, but many of its most-publicized efforts result in little, 
if any, slowdown in the drug trade.

"These big sweeps are going to have an impact for a little bit at the 
local level. It's going to be a blip. If you're a drug user, you're 
going to have a hard time getting your fix for a while," said Eric 
Sevigney, an assistant professor at the University of South Carolina 
who researches what happens to drug dealers after they are arrested. 
"But over a short period of time, the market is going to correct 
itself. And over the long-term period, there's really little effect 
in these types of seizures."

The AP conducted a detailed review of the operation. It tracked 193 
of the people arrested, filed Freedom of Information Act requests, 
analyzed thousands of pages of court records and interviewed dozens 
of people such as prisoners, former suspects, law enforcement agents 
and criminal law experts. Among the findings:

- -- Federal agents do not nab top cartel bosses. None of the bosses 
who control their syndicates have ever been arrested in the United 
States. They are all believed to be living in Mexico, where they can 
more easily dodge law enforcement.

- -- Many of the people they do arrest are not even middle management. 
They are low-level American street dealers and "mules" who help 
smuggle the drugs.

- -- A third of those arrested are already out on the streets. Jurors 
acquitted them, or prosecutors decided there was not enough evidence 
to hold them. Others jumped bail or went undercover for the DEA.

- -- Authorities often announce high arrest numbers, but some suspects 
are counted twice. An arrested street dealer may show up in the 
statistics of several Justice Department sweeps.

Operation Xcellerator was one of five major federal investigations 
targeting Mexican cartels in less than four years. The sweeps yielded 
more than 5,000 arrests and more than 160 tons of confiscated 
marijuana, cocaine, methamphetamine and heroin. But the cartels 
continue to distribute those drugs and bring their profits, estimated 
at more than $30 billion a year, home to Mexico.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom