Pubdate:  Sun, 24 Aug 1997

Source:   Houston Chronicle, page 1D
(http://www.chron.com/cgibin/auth/story/content/
chronicle/metropolitan/97/08/24/smugglersbeach.20.html)
Contact:  Smugglers' Blues

By JAMES PINKERTON, Houston Chronicle Rio Grande Valley Bureau

BOCA CHICA  A huge August moon rose over the Gulf of Mexico,
brightening a remote beach where a handful of families and
fishermen were camped along the surf.

They were not alone.

Behind a sand dune four U.S. Customs agents  two with night
vision telescopes  scanned the beach in the direction of the
mouth of the Rio Grande. Another dune concealed Texas National
Guardsmen peering into the night with similar hightech
equipment. Offshore, a Coast Guard patrol boat, with lights
extinguished, steamed past a line of anchored shrimpers while an
observation plane circled overhead.

The bustle was all part of Operation White Shark, the
government's ambitious response to a longstanding problem at the
southernmost tip of Texas.

For decades, professional smugglers have used the mouth of the
Rio Grande  and its miles of brushy, inland river bends  to
cross everything from avocados, parrots and uninspected cattle to
guns, dope and illegal immigrants.

Following an eightmonth effort last year, Operation White Shark
was restarted in late July. Three weeks ago, the government added
a roundtheclock checkpoint on the only road between Brownsville
and Boca Chica beach.

And while officials tout its deterrent effect and many beach
patrons welcome the presence of law enforcement officers, others
scoff at a joint police effort involving eight state and federal
agencies that has netted only 16 arrests of smugglers and 10,000
pounds of marijuana since its inception.

"It looks to me like a bunch of bull," said Gordon Williams,
longtime owner of Gordon's Bait and Tackle near the Port of
Brownsville. "It's just harassing a bunch of people and costing a
ton of money for nothing.

"I've been fishing at the mouth of the river for 50 years and
never seen anything or been bothered by anybody," he added. "And
we camp out there a week at a time."

The first phase of White Shark began in March 1996, when Customs
agents received information that tons of marijuana, on almost a
daily basis, were being delivered to cars waiting on the Boca
Chica beach.

Small fishing boats of the type widely used by Mexican shark
fishermen had been put into service by smugglers. They sped into
U.S. waters, ran up onto the beach and quickly offloaded sacks of
dope or undocumented immigrants. A round trip was completed in
minutes.

"We were picking up reports that smuggling by shark boat had
taken place on the beaches ... and they were bringing in ton
quantities of narcotics," said Alonzo Pena, who heads the U.S.
Customs Service office in Brownsville. "When we heard this, we
compared notes with other agencies, the Coast Guard, the Border
Patrol, the Department of Public Safety, and they were getting
similar information."

To halt the smuggling, Customs and seven other agencies launched
Operation White Shark on March 22, 1996. On that first day, Pena
said, officers setting up an observation post behind the sand
dunes on Boca Chica literally stumbled over a halfburied stash
of 1,071 pounds of marijuana.

In eight months of surveillance, agents seized 10,674 pounds of
pot, arrested 16 smugglers and linked another 30,000 pounds of
marijuana seized in several stash houses in Brownsville to the
seaborne smugglers.

Surveillance in the Boca Chica area was started again this July
22, and a week later the U.S. Border Patrol opened a checkpoint
on Texas 4 outside Brownsville.

While results at the highway checkpoint have not been spectacular
  no narcotics seizures and only 20 undocumented immigrants
arrested after three weeks  immigration officials believe that
is because they have largely forced smugglers away from the
beach.

"If we're not catching aliens, then (it is because) we're denying
them that area," said Arturo E. Moreno, a Border Patrol
supervisor in Brownsville.

The ease of using the mouth of the river as a border crossing was
evident last Monday, as Agent Pena watched the area with
binoculars. Here, the Rio Grande is barely 40 yards wide  boca
chica means "small mouth" in Spanish  and a sandbar reaches
almost across the mouth making wading an easy and quick task.

Under a midafternoon sun, two men in bathing suits backed a
trailer with a jet ski into the narrow river from the Mexican
side. In a few moments, the pair started the watercraft and
roared down into the surf, turned north and sped up the Texas
coast.

"They just motored up north and out of sight. They could have
easily stopped and dropped something off to someone on the beach,
and it would only take a few minutes," Pena noted. "This just
shows the many ways narcotics can be smuggled  by shark boat,
jet ski, rafts, john boats  the threat is just enormous.

"And that's the thing about the checkpoint, it levels the field
some because if they are going to get the dope out on the hardtop
they have to get it past that checkpoint."

While some residents see the checkpoint and other measures as an
unnecessary intrusion on a peaceful family beach, others hope the
law enforcement presence will halt the sometimes frightening
encounters they say they've had.

"One time at 7 in the morning, the (shark) boats went by and they
had a lot of people in the boat," said Linda Reyes, 14, of
Brownsville. "They got out and went up into those mountains (sand
dunes). They all had big bags, but I don't know what they had."

The young girl frequently tags along with her older brother,
Arturo Reyes, 16, who comes to Boca Chica several times a week to
catch redfish in the surf.

"Three years ago we came here to spend the night, and there was a
black truck that came by, shooting bullets," Arturo added. "It
did that two times, and there was nobody to call, not the Coast
Guard or anything."

One of those fishing on Boca Chica last week was Danny Gonzalez,
who had parked his truck a few feet from the water and set out
four heavy surf rods baited with bloody chunks of skipjack. A
butcher by trade, Gonzalez fishes Boca Chica two or three times a
week. He said a friend was robbed last year by bandits at the
mouth of the river as the two fished.

"We'd rather have (law enforcement) patrolling, because we do
come out at night to fish and sometimes stay overnight," said
Gonzalez. "We've had confrontations at night, guys with a bunch
of tattoos will come up and ask for matches. I think they were
really trying to check us out, see if we were the police."

One of the last places to buy bait, beer and ice on the way to
Boca Chica is the Country Corner on the outskirts of Brownsville,
operated for 30 years by Mike Frazier.

Frazier believes Boca Chica is getting a bum rap, adding that
none of his customers has ever complained about their safety on
the beach. The Cameron County Sheriff's Office has logged just 17
reports of incidents at Boca Chica during the last two years, the
most serious a drunken family brawl that ended in a fistfight,
Frazier said.

During the first weekend of the checkpoints, zealous Border
Patrol agents searched ice coolers and fishing tackle boxes
looking for narcotics, Frazier said.

"Now let's get real," he said. "Who are they trying to catch, you
and me, or the bad guys? It seems like our own guys are after
us."

And while the merchant supports random checkpoints, he said the
roundtheclock inspections have only served to reduce traffic to
the beach by half.

"To have a continuous one where you pull over every single
vehicle, no sir, there's no need for that and it's an abuse of
someone's power," said Frazier.

However, Border Patrol officers at the checkpoint and their
supervisors insist the majority of residents welcome their
presence.

"Most people are pretty positive," said Will Oestreich, one of
three Border Patrol agents inspecting cars returning from the
beach on Monday. "They're thankful it's clearing up some of the
problems they've been having on the beach."

And while active U.S. military units have been suspended from
performing counternarcotics work on the TexasMexico border in
the wake of a fatal shooting near Big Bend National Park,
Operation White Shark continues to receive assistance from the
Texas National Guard.

Pena, of Customs, who is coordinating the operation, said up to
15 guardsmen are manning concealed observation posts along the
coast.

Pena said the guardsmen, who are allowed to carry firearms for
selfdefense, are welltrained, professional soldiers with
extensive experience in other covert antidrug operations. They
have agreed to a limited role in White Shark, he said.

"Before we go on an operation, we go over the rules of
engagement, the firearm policy, we went over the Posse Comitatus
law, and just emphasize what their function is," Pena said. "It's
not a law enforcement function. It's passing on information to
us. The law enforcement effort as far as arrest and seizures is
to be done by law enforcement personnel.

"We specifically go over these things and have a clear
understanding of this, and they sign a memorandum of
understanding prior to them taking part in the operation," he
added.

A Guard spokesman said the soldiers operate only when law
enforcement agents are present.  Pena said National Guard troops
have set up as many as four observation posts in the low sand
dunes overlooking the beach and operate a LORIS telescope system
  a longrange military system with infrared technology  to
help spot smugglers.

"They are basically observers," Pena said. "They go out, set up
and monitor and conduct surveillance. If they see a shark boat,
they report that activity to us, but they take no action."

The Texas National Guard members working on Operation White Shark
are among 400 guardsmen assigned to counterdrug efforts. Their
duties include aerial and land surveillance and cargo inspection
at border ports of entry. The Guard activities are financed by a
$17.9 million contract with the U.S. Department of Defense, said
Lt. Col. Ed Komandosky at Austin headquarters.

Pena expects to see seaborne smugglers attempt to make longer
trips up the coast and deliver narcotics north of Boca Chica
along South Padre Island or even further to Port Mansfield,
nearly 60 miles from the border.

"If we don't see any more narcotics (seized on Boca Chica), we
think that will mean Operation White Shark was successful," he
said. "We've shut that beach off to drug smuggling."