Drugs’ Super Highway

[Sonny Clark]

[ This piece was written on 4/30/2006. It speaks not only to present day illegal drug issues, but also to the illegal immigration issue.]

Drugs' Super Highway


Mexico’s President Fox finally gives in to “Colombian Drug Lords”. The “Crime Cartels” are winning the war against law enforcement. It appears that Mexico wants a huge “slice of the pie” by creating a “super highway” for everything from illegal drugs to terrorists. Soon, our southern border will be just an imaginary geographical line and no obstacle for crime.


We’ve already turned our backs to Afghanistan’s poppy crops and the enormous opium trade, not to mention our failed effort to oust Colombia’s Drug Lords years ago. Now, our friend to the south turns a deaf ear to Bush’s pleas to help control illegal drugs from crossing the border into the U.S. What will be next to cross our southern border, terrorists?


Though President Fox is playing down the significance of legalizing “personal use” drugs, the new law will permit drugs to enter their country unrestricted, which means safe passage through their country into ours. This is no doubt, music to the ears of organized crime, and drug kingpins here in the U.S. Couple this with the possibility of “Illegals” being given permission to come and go at will through our borders, and you have a super highway for crime.


Will this new Mexican law stretch the resources of our Homeland Security Agency, the DEA, the INS, and our Border Patrol? Only time will tell how much of an impact Mexico’s new drug law will have on our ability to control illegal drug trafficking at our southern border. It’s a well-known fact that many times the amount of illegal drugs makes it onto our streets than are confiscated at our borders. We have never gained ground on the smuggling of illegal drugs into this country even though we’ve thrown billions of dollars at the problem.


Personally, I don’t believe we can ever completely stop illegal drugs from entering the U.S. I also believe that the new Mexican Drug Law will at least double the amount of illegal drugs crossing our southern border. And, if our immigration laws are rewritten in a way that’ll allow “Illegals” temporary work status and permitted to pass back and forth across the border, I believe illegal drug traffic could triple.


The question then becomes “how much money are we willing to spend on a seemingly lost cause”? I know of no way to stop illegal drugs from finding their way onto our streets, or stopping them from entering the U.S. from Mexico. Another point to consider is the drugs that are manufactured right here in the U.S., which we can’t stop either. Would it be wise to divert some of the money presently spent on fighting illegal drugs to a program that could produce positive and meaningful results for citizens?

 

[waltky]

Columbia knocks drug king off his hill...

Colombian military kills warlord of rural cocaine fiefdom
Oct 2,`15 -- A years-long manhunt for a ruthless cocaine warlord who ruled a remote rural fiefdom with an armed band and generous bribes has ended with a military raid that killed the man officials called Colombia's second most-wanted criminal.

Victor Navarro, a 39-year-old better known by the alias "Megateo," long dominated the historically lawless Catatumbo region that hugs Venezuela. It is where he was killed Thursday night in a ground and air attack, authorities said. Law officials had been fixated on him because of what he represented: the possible future of organized crime in Colombia if nearly three-year-old peace talks between the government and the country's largest rebel group succeed. With a $5 million U.S. bounty on his head and a 2011 drug-trafficking indictment pending in Florida, Navarro had faced 45 arrest warrants and Colombian prosecutors said he was suspected in dozens of killings.

He was especially hunted for a 2006 ambush in which his men killed 17 soldiers and intelligence agents who had set out from Bogota to capture him but were betrayed by a double agent, a secret police detective who abandoned the operation at the last minute and is now serving a 40-year sentence for murder. Navarro claimed to lead the last remaining faction of the Popular Liberation Army, a rebel movement that disbanded in 1991. But to authorities, he was nothing more than one of Colombia's main cocaine traffickers, a criminal heavyweight whose muscle and ability to evade capture derived from the fear he instilled and alliances he made with gangs of former far-right militiamen and with the country's two largest rebel groups.

Colombia's most-wanted criminal, Dario Antonio Usuga, is a veteran of far-right militias who heads a much larger organization known as the Urabenos, with an estimated 2,000 gunmen. A thickly built man of medium height, Navarro was notorious for his garish jewelry. He wore a big gold ring on each hand - one encrusted with diamonds, the other emeralds. In one photo police obtained in a raid, a golden pistol hangs from a necklace. His brazenness drew comparisons, although in miniature, to Pablo Escobar, the cocaine kingpin who terrorized Colombia for two decades until he was killed by police in 1993.

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[waltky]

Drug drone drop confiscation is first of it's kind...

A First: U.S. Border Patrol Confiscates Drugs Dropped by Drone in Arizona
January 13, 2016 | U.S. Border agents say they confiscated around 31 pounds of marijuana dropped in the Arizona desert by a drone late last year.

The Nov. 16 incident is the "first drone drug incursion" detected by Customs and Border Protection, the agency announced on Tuesday. Agents at the Yuma Station watched an OctoCopter-style drone illegally enter U.S. airspace near San Luis, Arizona from Rio Colorado, Mexico and "jettison a bundle."

Using night vision goggles, the Border Patrol Agents followed the drone to its drop point, where three bundles of marijuana -- weighing around ten pounds each -- were discovered along the bank of a canal, the news release said. The drugs had an estimated value of $15,430, said the Border Patrol.

Workers demonstrate the use of an octocopter-style drone for power line inspections at a New York Power Authority site in the Catskills, near Blenheim, N.Y​

CBP says its "highly effective enforcement techniques" have forced smugglers to "redirect their efforts." “As a result, they experiment with different techniques in an attempt to bring narcotics and other harmful contraband into the United States," Chief Patrol Agent Anthony J. Porvaznik said. "This means we must adapt and meet these new challenges. Our agents’ vigilance was responsible for detecting this particular drone event, but we always encourage members of the public to assist our efforts by contacting the Border Patrol upon seeing suspicious activity.”

A First: U.S. Border Patrol Confiscates Drugs Dropped by Drone in Arizona

 

[waltky]

Coast Guard cutter seizes $80M worth of cocaine...

Cutter Campbell Seizes Cocaine Worth $80 Million
Feb 18, 2016 - A single U.S. Coast Guard vessel seized more than $80 million worth of cocaine and "rescued eight Cuban migrants" during a two-month deployment in the Caribbean Sea and Eastern Pacific Ocean.

The Coast Guard on Wednesday announced the Campbell, a 270-foot medium endurance cutter, returned to Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine, on Sunday after a 61-day narcotics patrol. "In the span of one month Campbell seized or disrupted a total of seven smuggling vessels carrying cocaine from South America bound for the United States," the Coast Guard said in a statement. "The amount of cocaine seized was estimated to be 4,800 pounds and worth more than $80 million dollars. In addition, Campbell's crew rescued eight Cuban migrants attempting to sail from Cuba to the United States in an unseaworthy vessel."

The Coast Guard Cutter Campbell slices through the water more than 30 years ago.​

The Campbell cutter was supported by the Joint-Interagency Task Force-South, an international operation designed to disrupt drug trafficking. The vessel worked with air, land and sea assets from the U.S. Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland Security and from agencies from other countries.

"The amount of success we experienced is a true testament to the professionalism of the crew and their dedication to the mission," Cmdr. Michael Nasitka, Campbell's commanding officer, said in a statement. "The patrol was extremely busy and the crew spent the holidays away from their families. Despite this, the crew rose to every challenge in order to achieve success at thwarting transnational crime in the Western Hemisphere."

Cutter Campbell Seizes Cocaine Worth $80 Million | Military.com

See also:

Navy Budget Confirms Plans to Cut Purchases of Littoral Combat Ships
Feb 09, 2016 | It's official: The U.S. Navy plans to reduce its Littoral Combat Ship buy from 52 to 40 vessels over the next five years, according to the service's fiscal 2017 budget request released on Tuesday.

With a base budget request of $155.4 billion, the Navy's spending plan for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1 is about $4 billion less than it was for fiscal 2016, though some of that will be offset by a $9.5 billion request in overseas contingency operations funding. The Navy is also set to lose 4,400 active-duty sailors, nearly all enlisted, as it approaches a long-term steady state that will have 50,000 sailors underway on ships year-round. This end strength reduction, from 327,300 sailors to 322,900 sailors, represents the most significant reduction in forces since fiscal 2012. Current projections show the service maintaining its end strength after this year with small adjustments, with a projected active-duty force of 323,100 by fiscal 2021. "Over the next five years the Navy will continue to make adjustments to properly size manpower accounts to reflect force structure decisions, reduce manning gaps at sea, and improve fleet readiness," the service budget request states.

In a briefing to reporters at the Pentagon, Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Budget Rear Adm. William Lescher said the drawdown would take place through natural attrition, primarily as the service deactivates its 10th Carrier Air Wing in the coming fiscal year. This deactivation, he said, will also allow the Navy to match its air wings up with its deployable aircraft carriers, and shore up readiness through the reallocation of aircraft to remaining wings.

This strategy has its critics, though. In one of a series of statements Tuesday criticizing the Navy’s budget request, Rep. Randy Forbes, R-Va., chairman of the House Armed Services seapower and projection forces subcommittee, called the deactivation of a carrier air wing a "dangerous" move. "This administration is committed to the reduction of our naval forces. Two years ago, they proposed to eliminate an aircraft carrier. This year, they want to eliminate an aircraft carrier wing. I think this is a dangerous trajectory," Forbes said. "My subcommittee added almost $1 billion to ensure we retain our aircraft carrier force structure and have added over $2 billion to support additional strike fighters over the last two years. I opposed the elimination of the aircraft carrier and will seek to oppose any ill advised reductions in our aircraft carrier wing."

The Navy's budget outlook has been a subject of much speculation since December, when Defense Secretary Ashton Carter sent a memo ordering the service to decrease its long-term LCS and frigate buy by 12 ships, down-select to one variant and builder, and reinvest some of the savings in aircraft and other weapons systems. The service's budget request keeps to that plan, with funding to purchase two LCS in fiscal 2017 and one each until 2020.

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[waltky]

Granny says, "Dat's right - an' `sides dat, dey'll goof ya out - like Uncle Ferd...

US: Psychoactive Drugs Pose Worldwide Threat
March 03, 2016 | WASHINGTON — Illegal heroin and psychoactive substances pose emerging worldwide threats, an annual State Department report to Congress said.

The International Narcotics Control Strategy report, released Wednesday, offers details on efforts by foreign governments to reduce drug production and trafficking and related money laundering and terrorist financing. Improved international reporting on drug use has led to a better understanding of heroin and psychoactive drug problems worldwide, a State Department representative told VOA on background.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) of the U.S. Department of Justice released photo shows heroin seized from "Seaboard Pride" at Port of Miami, Florida on January 10, 2012 and released in New York on February 4, 2014.​

Resurgence of heroin use

More than half of the countries listed in the report cite heroin as one of their major drug control problems. The resurgence of heroin in the United States was also listed as among the "most unwelcome recent developments" in the control of illegal narcotics. Cocaine use also increased, with rates growing in "many countries and regions where it was uncommon only a decade or so ago," the report said.

Colombian anti-narcotics policemen inspect packs of cocaine at the police base in Necocli​

The report also found psychoactive drugs are a "rapidly spreading danger, particularly in Africa and in much of Asia" due to cheap production and the difficulty of regulating their manufacture. The U.S. released the report ahead of the United Nations General Assembly's first session on drug control for the international community in almost 20 years. The session is set for April.

US: Psychoactive Drugs Pose Worldwide Threat

 

[waltky]

70 lbs. of cocaine...

California judge denies bail for flight attendant in drug case
Fri Mar 25, 2016 - A federal judge in California on Friday effectively overruled a Brooklyn magistrate and ordered a flight attendant held without bail on charges that she dumped a bag of cocaine and fled authorities at Los Angeles International Airport.

The decision by U.S. District Judge Andre Birotte in Los Angeles came a day after the federal magistrate in the New York City borough of Brooklyn set bail at $500,000 for her release. Flight attendant Marsha Reynolds, 31, must now remain in custody until she is transported to California to face the charges. Her next court hearing in Los Angeles is set for April 7.

Reynolds, a JetBlue Airways Corp employee and a former college sprinter who was raised in the borough of Queens, is charged with possession of cocaine with intent to distribute. She is accused of dropping a bag containing almost 70 pounds (32 kg) of cocaine when she was randomly selected for screening at the Los Angeles airport last Friday, taking off her shoes and dashing away. She later turned herself in to authorities in New York.

The magistrate in Brooklyn had granted her release on a $500,000 bond but put the order on hold until Friday to allow the judge in California, where she would face trial, to weigh in. On Friday Judge Birotte ordered her "to remain in custody and await transport by the United States Marshal to the Central District of California."

California judge denies bail for flight attendant in drug case

 

[shadow355]

[ This piece was written on 4/30/2006. It speaks not only to present day illegal drug issues, but also to the illegal immigration issue.]

Drugs' Super Highway


Mexico’s President Fox finally gives in to “Colombian Drug Lords”. The “Crime Cartels” are winning the war against law enforcement. It appears that Mexico wants a huge “slice of the pie” by creating a “super highway” for everything from illegal drugs to terrorists. Soon, our southern border will be just an imaginary geographical line and no obstacle for crime.


We’ve already turned our backs to Afghanistan’s poppy crops and the enormous opium trade, not to mention our failed effort to oust Colombia’s Drug Lords years ago. Now, our friend to the south turns a deaf ear to Bush’s pleas to help control illegal drugs from crossing the border into the U.S. What will be next to cross our southern border, terrorists?


Though President Fox is playing down the significance of legalizing “personal use” drugs, the new law will permit drugs to enter their country unrestricted, which means safe passage through their country into ours. This is no doubt, music to the ears of organized crime, and drug kingpins here in the U.S. Couple this with the possibility of “Illegals” being given permission to come and go at will through our borders, and you have a super highway for crime.


Will this new Mexican law stretch the resources of our Homeland Security Agency, the DEA, the INS, and our Border Patrol? Only time will tell how much of an impact Mexico’s new drug law will have on our ability to control illegal drug trafficking at our southern border. It’s a well-known fact that many times the amount of illegal drugs makes it onto our streets than are confiscated at our borders. We have never gained ground on the smuggling of illegal drugs into this country even though we’ve thrown billions of dollars at the problem.


Personally, I don’t believe we can ever completely stop illegal drugs from entering the U.S. I also believe that the new Mexican Drug Law will at least double the amount of illegal drugs crossing our southern border. And, if our immigration laws are rewritten in a way that’ll allow “Illegals” temporary work status and permitted to pass back and forth across the border, I believe illegal drug traffic could triple.


The question then becomes “how much money are we willing to spend on a seemingly lost cause”? I know of no way to stop illegal drugs from finding their way onto our streets, or stopping them from entering the U.S. from Mexico. Another point to consider is the drugs that are manufactured right here in the U.S., which we can’t stop either. Would it be wise to divert some of the money presently spent on fighting illegal drugs to a program that could produce positive and meaningful results for citizens?

Illicit Drug Transport routes.

1) Interstate 95 from Florida, "up to" New York. - #1 in my opinion

2) Interstate 77 from South Carolina to Cleveland, Ohio.

I would love to patrol a interstate and do nothing but "Interdiction". In my younger days, I tried for a Law Enforcement Career over a course of 10 years - but always made middle or upper middle score, instead of high score.....and the "High Scorers" were always the ones that got hired. I so desired a Turnpike job.

I wanted to be "On the Turnpike.....working interdiction." Or in the mountains of the far eastern side of the state.

Dreams......They get ya no where.

Shadow 355

 

[Sonny Clark]

[ This piece was written on 4/30/2006. It speaks not only to present day illegal drug issues, but also to the illegal immigration issue.]

Drugs' Super Highway


Mexico’s President Fox finally gives in to “Colombian Drug Lords”. The “Crime Cartels” are winning the war against law enforcement. It appears that Mexico wants a huge “slice of the pie” by creating a “super highway” for everything from illegal drugs to terrorists. Soon, our southern border will be just an imaginary geographical line and no obstacle for crime.


We’ve already turned our backs to Afghanistan’s poppy crops and the enormous opium trade, not to mention our failed effort to oust Colombia’s Drug Lords years ago. Now, our friend to the south turns a deaf ear to Bush’s pleas to help control illegal drugs from crossing the border into the U.S. What will be next to cross our southern border, terrorists?


Though President Fox is playing down the significance of legalizing “personal use” drugs, the new law will permit drugs to enter their country unrestricted, which means safe passage through their country into ours. This is no doubt, music to the ears of organized crime, and drug kingpins here in the U.S. Couple this with the possibility of “Illegals” being given permission to come and go at will through our borders, and you have a super highway for crime.


Will this new Mexican law stretch the resources of our Homeland Security Agency, the DEA, the INS, and our Border Patrol? Only time will tell how much of an impact Mexico’s new drug law will have on our ability to control illegal drug trafficking at our southern border. It’s a well-known fact that many times the amount of illegal drugs makes it onto our streets than are confiscated at our borders. We have never gained ground on the smuggling of illegal drugs into this country even though we’ve thrown billions of dollars at the problem.


Personally, I don’t believe we can ever completely stop illegal drugs from entering the U.S. I also believe that the new Mexican Drug Law will at least double the amount of illegal drugs crossing our southern border. And, if our immigration laws are rewritten in a way that’ll allow “Illegals” temporary work status and permitted to pass back and forth across the border, I believe illegal drug traffic could triple.


The question then becomes “how much money are we willing to spend on a seemingly lost cause”? I know of no way to stop illegal drugs from finding their way onto our streets, or stopping them from entering the U.S. from Mexico. Another point to consider is the drugs that are manufactured right here in the U.S., which we can’t stop either. Would it be wise to divert some of the money presently spent on fighting illegal drugs to a program that could produce positive and meaningful results for citizens?

Illicit Drug Transport routes.

1) Interstate 95 from Florida, "up to" New York. - #1 in my opinion

2) Interstate 77 from South Carolina to Cleveland, Ohio.

I would love to patrol a interstate and do nothing but "Interdiction". In my younger days, I tried for a Law Enforcement Career over a course of 10 years - but always made middle or upper middle score, instead of high score.....and the "High Scorers" were always the ones that got hired. I so desired a Turnpike job.

I wanted to be "On the Turnpike.....working interdiction." Or in the mountains of the far eastern side of the state.

Dreams......They get ya no where.

Shadow 355

Well, in my opinion, it's best that you didn't get into law enforcement. In today's America, members of law enforcement are NOT respected. They're low-life pieces of shit. Just be thankful that you're not one of the jerks that we have to contend with.

 

[shadow355]

They're low-life pieces of shit. Just be thankful that you're not one of the jerks that we have to contend with.

I disagree.

Kentucky State Police

Kentucky Commercial Vehicle Enforcement

U.S. Marshals - Judicial Security ( Awesome )

U.S State Department - Diplomatic Security Service

Shadow 355

 

[Sonny Clark]

They're low-life pieces of shit. Just be thankful that you're not one of the jerks that we have to contend with.

I disagree.

Kentucky State Police

Kentucky Commercial Vehicle Enforcement

U.S. Marshals - Judicial Security ( Awesome )

U.S State Department - Diplomatic Security Service

Shadow 355

It's fine. We can agree to disagree. No problem.
So, you approve of and condone cops killing unarmed citizens, teens, babies, committing acts of rape, molestation, taking bribes, selling drugs, practicing brutality, lying under oath in a court of law, writing bullshit quota tickets, stealing, committing spousal abuse, using their power and authority to intimidate and commit assault, and breaking the same laws that they arrest others for?

 

[waltky]

Granny says, "Dat's right - put `em in jail...

Underage Mexican Drug Mules in for a Shock
May 4, 2016 - Not long ago, underage drug mules caught by federal authorities were rarely prosecuted in Cochise County.

Mario Nieblas shuffled into the courtroom in ankle chains and mismatched jail scrubs: green-and-white pants worn by juvenile inmates, red-and-white top worn by adults. He was arrested on suspicion of smuggling nearly 90 pounds of marijuana from his native Mexico in March and turned 17 in a holding cell. Now he was in court trying to avoid being sent to an adult prison. “Mario will be housed and that’s it,” his lawyer, Xochitl Orozco, told the judge. “They are giving up on this individual before he started.” The prosecution is part of a new strategy by Cochise County to deter drug cartels from their longtime practice of using children as drug mules.

Since they launched the effort — known as Operation Immediate Consequences — last May, county prosecutors have charged 51 juveniles as adults with drug trafficking, offering them 18 months in an adult prison in exchange for a guilty plea. The youngest was 14. All but Nieblas and one other accepted the deal, at least in some cases without legal representation. Not long ago, underage drug mules caught by federal authorities were rarely prosecuted in Cochise County. Prosecutors stopped accepting such cases in 1973 under the premise that the county did not have the resources to handle them. The same was — and still is — true in other Arizona counties. Not surprisingly, that made children ideal drug mules.

Mario Nieblas-Villalobos, 17, faces drug trafficking charges in adult court on April 28 under a Cochise County, Ariz., program called Operation Immediate Consequences, which seeks to deter young men and women from participating in marijuana trafficking on the U.S.- Mexico border.[/center]

It was a crime with few consequences. The U.S. Border Patrol would confiscate the drugs and send the teens back to Mexico — only to see them again weeks or even days later. The new policy has been a shock to the teenagers who get caught, according to Cochise County Attorney Brian McIntyre. “Just turn me loose, get it over with,” he said they tell the border agents, who then deliver the bad news: They are being turned over to the county sheriff’s office for prosecution. “Then, frankly, the tears start coming,” McIntyre said. Charging them as adults ensures that the county can detain them. Juveniles charged with drug trafficking are often put on probation and released.

County authorities would not say how many of the underage suspects were provided with public defenders. Nieblas originally accepted the county’s plea bargain offer — without the benefit of a lawyer. He acknowledged using a seat belt to rappel over the border wall from Agua Prieta, Mexico, into a remote corner of Douglas, Ariz., with another young smuggler. From there, he said, he ran to help collect two burlap bags of marijuana that had been hurled over the wall. The plan was to deliver them to a waiting car. But after he was assigned an attorney, Nieblas rescinded his plea and decided to fight to have the case sent to a juvenile court. If he loses that bid, he could be sentenced to as many as three years in adult prison — double the sentence in the plea agreement.

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See also:

Border Patrol's 'Tunnel Rats' Work in Tight Spaces
May 5, 2016 - You can’t be claustrophobic if you want to work for the U.S. Border Patrol’s Tunnel Entry team -- the unit that explores underground drug-smuggling passages near the U.S.-Mexican border.

To prove they don’t freak out in tight spaces, prospective confined-space rescue technicians, or “tunnel rats,” have to wriggle through a two foot-wide pipe for about 20 yards before they can join the squad. “You know right off if it’s playing with someone’s mind,” said Lance LeNoir, who leads the five person squad. “It takes some psyching up, to say the least, to do the job.” Given their job description, tunnel team members need steady nerves. Underground passages beneath the U.S.-Mexican border have become longer and tighter over the last decade, according to law enforcement officials.

Lance LeNoir of the Border Patrol's Tunnel Rat team walks to the end of the Galvez tunnel, which comes north from a warehouse in Tijuana to near San Diego's Otay Mesa neighborhood.​

Between 2006 and 2013, the average completed tunnel in the San Diego area had air vents and machinery to transport drugs. They also extended roughly 1,750 feet and were about 3½ feet wide, according to statistics provided by U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement officials. Over the last two years, however, the average tunnel has stretched to a total length of about 2,450 feet, while its width has shrunk to just over 2½ feet. The latest San Diego County tunnel, discovered last month in the Otay Mesa neighborhood, was 2,700 feet long and 3 feet wide, authorities said.

The passages are often twisty, especially as they get to the U.S. side of the border and tunnelers try to burrow to an exit point -- usually in a warehouse or other building. That's about as easy as trying to park a car in the dark without any headlights, LeNoir said. After a tunnel’s discovery, Mexican authorities usually go through first to clear any remaining smugglers. Then LeNoir and his team enter from the U.S. side after making sure the tunnel isn’t in danger of collapsing and that there’s breathable air. They remove any leftover drugs or evidence while also mapping the tunnel’s path. Most of the passages are at least 30 feet underground, making some technology nearly impossible to use. “It’s a GPS-denied environment,” LeNoir said.

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