Another disguised vehicle nabbed by Border Patrol

By Greg Gross
SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE BREAKING NEWS TEAM

2:22 p.m. August 15, 2008

SAN DIEGO – Three days ago, it was a drug-smuggling attempt in the backcountry using a sedan disguised as a utility company car. This time, it was a pickup in San Ysidro, made to look like a construction-company truck in an attempt to smuggle immigrants into the United States from Mexico.
Sedan disguised as SDG&E vehicle can't fool Border Patrol


Different vehicle, different cargo, different guise, same result – busted by Border Patrol agents.

The pickup had been made up to look like a truck from the Kiewitt Corporation, a construction firm currently working on a large project near the border, a Border Patrol spokesman said.

The masquerade extended to the pickup's driver, who was wearing a yellow hard hat and a reflective orange safety vest, the spokesman said.

Border Patrol agents grew suspicious, however, when they saw the truck park briefly in a secluded spot along the border fence. When a radio check revealed that the pickup belonged not to Kiewitt, but to a private resident of San Diego, they decided to stop the vehicle.

Seeing the agents, the truck driver sped off down Dairy Mart Road, but agents stopped the pickup near Interstate 5 with the help of a spike strip, the spokesman said. The driver was arrested.

A check of the vehicle found one illegal immigrant in the cab and 10 more in the truck bed, crammed into a false toolbox, the spokesman said.

This comes three days after a woman was caught by Border Patrol agents near Campo trying to smuggle 223 pounds of marijuana across the border in a Ford Taurus made to look like a car from San Diego Gas & Electric.

-Greg Gross: (619) 293-1889; greg.gross@uniontrib.com

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metr ... uggle.html