Thread: Feds halt more cash en route to Mexico UPDATED

Feds halt more cash en route to Mexico

Southbound vehicles screened

by Dennis Wagner - Dec. 26, 2009 12:00 AM
The Arizona Republic .

Seizures of cash bound primarily for Mexico's violent drug cartels more than quadrupled this year along the Arizona border thanks to beefed up screening at U.S. checkpoints.

In fiscal 2008, inspectors intercepted $1.1 million heading into Mexico. This year, they netted nearly $4.9 million.

Brian Levin, a spokesman for Customs and Border Protection, said the surge in seizures is a direct result of the Obama administration's decision to send more manpower, high-tech equipment and cash-sniffing dogs to monitor traffic on southbound lanes at ports along the Arizona-Sonora line.

"We've put a lot more resources on southbound vehicles," Levin said.

Although the amount confiscated is just a fraction of the millions of dollars in drug- and human-smuggling profits funneled back to Mexican syndicates each year, Levin said the seizures reflect a new focus in the smuggling clampdown and the U.S. efforts to help Mexico fight its bloody drug war.

Since President Felipe Calderón declared a war on drugs in 2006, more than 13,000 people have been killed in Mexico. Drug-related crimes are spilling across the border into the U.S., including Arizona.

Weapon targeted

Until this year, U.S. inspections on the border primarily targeted incoming traffic from Mexico while ignoring vehicles headed south.

But shortly after President Barack Obama took office nearly a year ago, federal authorities intensified outbound screening amid reports that weapons smuggled from the United States were providing most of the firepower in Mexico's drug wars. Authorities estimated that 90 percent of the guns used in police assassinations and cartel bloodshed originated in the United States.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano assigned an additional $400 million to border security, much of it for screening outbound traffic.

That money went for more inspectors, X-ray machines and other gear.

One of those caught amid the heightened scrutiny was Francisco Vera-Moroyoqui, who arrived at an inspection station in downtown Nogales in March with his father, Efren Vera-Romero.

Inside their Dodge Durango, officers discovered a hidden ceiling compartment containing more than $1.4 million. Romero pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 37 months in prison. His son is awaiting sentencing.

Under federal law, cash transactions or shipments of more than $10,000 must be declared, whether in the form of currency or wire transfers.

The regulation was designed to thwart cartel efforts to move illicit funds through banks, and U.S. investigators have cracked down on electronic transfers.

Because of that, cartels frequently rely on so-called "mules" - employees who are paid to transport cash into Mexico in hidden vehicle compartments or taped to their bodies.

On Dec. 15, for example, officers in Nogales searched a truck and discovered a suitcase containing 30 stacks of bills wrapped in black tape, a haul of more than $300,000. The vehicle's occupants, Francisco Pineda-Castaneda and Francisco Vera Ibarra, admitted smuggling the money for a fee of $500 each, according to Customs and Border Protection.

As a complement to the increased inspections on the U.S. side of the border, Mexican authorities have launched their own screening system to catch contraband arriving from the United States.

Under a first-of-its-kind program known by its Spanish acronym, SIAVE, checkpoints are under construction in Sonora and all along the border. Cameras will record the license plate, model and weight of every passing vehicle while also capturing images of passengers. Suspicious cars and trucks will be subject to human inspection.

For inspectors, the relentless line of cars to be checked can seem overwhelming, Levin said.

"When you're out there doing this day after day, you're looking for that needle in the haystack, the brass ring, the one item that makes this worthwhile," he said.

Levin said there also is an element of danger. He said several southbound drivers have tried to bypass the checkpoints, crashing through to the Mexican side while nearly hitting inspectors.

Because of that, Customs and Border Protection recently installed a gauntlet of concrete barriers for outgoing vehicles at the Mariposa Port in Nogales.

"We're trying to make it more difficult for anyone to even think about doing this," Levin said.

http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/ ... h1226.html

Drug cash pouring across Mexico border

Published: Dec. 26, 2009 at 12:52 PM

Share MEXICO CITY, Dec. 26 (UPI) -- A river of cash proceeds is flowing across the U.S. border to Mexican drug cartels every day, officials say.

Thanks to crackdowns on money laundering in the United States, more of the cartel's cash is being shipped back to Mexico via ingenious smuggling methods, and border officials are only stopping a small slice of it, The New York Times reported Saturday.

The newspaper said that even though authorities seized $138 million last year, it's only a modest piece of the $18 billion to $39 billion a year the Drug Enforcement Agency estimates is being smuggled to Mexico every year.

John Feeley, deputy chief of mission of the United States Embassy in Mexico City, told the Times Mexico and the United States are going to devote even more energy to going after the cartels' profits, which reportedly are laundered through legitimate businesses such as spas and day-care centers.

"There is an enormous amount of money that is flowing undetected and uninterdicted," added John Morton, assistant secretary for immigration and customs enforcement. "We are trying to be a step ahead of the people moving the money. Unfortunately, right now we are a step behind."

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2009/12/ ... 261849945/

They want the CASH WAY WAY more than they want the Illegals, drugs, or weapons....If i know my government well, and i do

Originally Posted by Tbow009

They want the CASH WAY WAY more than they want the Illegals, drugs, or weapons....If i know my government well, and i do

If the Feds find drugs the only thing they can do with them is destroy them. If they find guns or ammo some can be given to city, county, state of federal law enfocement agencies to use but most are destroyed.

If the feds find cash it goes to the federal treasury, if city, county or state officers find cash their agency usually gets to keep some of it and most goes to the federal treasury, so it is best to find the cash. It's like a tax on drug sales. As Yogi Berra migh have said, "Cash, it's as good as money".

RELATED

But where does the money go?

"Those funds generally go into the U.S. Treasury Department forfeiture fund and then it's put back into law enforcement for various purposes."

http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-177462.html

RELATED

OUTBOUND INSPECTIONS

Federal Agents Seize $40 Million Cash and 600 Guns From U.S./Mexico Border in 7 Months

November 6, 2009

http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-177462.html

Originally Posted by Tbow009

They want the CASH WAY WAY more than they want the Illegals, drugs, or weapons....If i know my government well, and i do

Info on the drugs and guns:

TX. Border Patrol Agents Seize $5 Million Worth of Marijuana

http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-182784.html


U.S. Border Patrol Weekly Blotter Dec. 23, 2009

http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-182785.html


November 2009 C.B.P. News Releases

http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-179975-releases.html


I.C.E. News Releases November 2009

http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-179973-releases.html


Federal Agents Seize $40 Million Cash and 600 Guns From U.S./Mexico Border in 7 Months

November 6, 2009

http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-177462.html

Along U.S.-Mexico Border, a Torrent of Illicit Cash

Posted on 26. Dec, 2009 by Shera Crossan in Business & Finance,
Economy, Foreign and Domestic Intelligence, Hidden Crimes, Immigration, Shera Crossan

LAREDO, Tex. — The streets of Laredo are awash in money, stacks of grimy bills tainted with cocaine residue, wrapped in plastic and stowed in secret compartments built into the trucks, buses and cars that flow south over the Mexican border daily like a motorized river.

Customs officials have discovered a host of ingenious hiding places, from $3 million secreted in the floor of a Mexican passenger bus to $1.6 million stuffed in duffel bags and balanced atop the heads of people wading across the Rio Grande to Mexico.

At border crossings and airports alone, American customs officers seized $57.9 million in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, up 74 percent from the previous year. And once the money lands in Mexico, it is easily swept into a largely unregulated underground cash economy or laundered through seemingly legitimate businesses.

As the United States has tightened bank regulations and clamped down on sophisticated money-laundering schemes in the past 35 years, more of the money from illicit drug sales is being smuggled across the border to Mexico the old-fashioned way, law enforcement officials say.

American officials say stopping the bulk cash shipments and scuttling money laundering are critical to crippling the cartels in Mexico, which have unleashed a wave of violence that has claimed more than 15,000 lives since President Felipe Calderón began cracking down on their operations in December 2006.

Law enforcement officials and business owners in Mexico say that the assault on the cartels has driven drug traffickers to branch out into an array of other money-making ventures, setting up businesses like spas and day care centers to launder drug proceeds or selling new products like pirated movies or pilfered oil.

“It’s a natural evolution of criminal activity, just as with the mob in the 1950s,â€

I have NO PROBLEM with US government agencies siezing and keeping cash that they confiscate. As long as the cash is CLEARLY being transported illegally. As long as signs are clearly posted prior to crossing ....that all undeclared cash above a certain amount will be confiscated regardless of the source of the cash. Big signs.

Originally Posted by JohnDoe2

RELATED

OUTBOUND INSPECTIONS

Federal Agents Seize $40 Million Cash and 600 Guns From U.S./Mexico Border in 7 Months

November 6, 2009

http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-177462.html

600 guns in 7 months? Whoa that's a whopper! So does that mean the all the cartels combined have 700 guns? 90% of their guns come from the US, so it must be so, no?