Thread: Arrests up, ATF strained with gun smuggling

Arrests up, ATF strained with gun smuggling

August 30, 2008 - 2:46PM
By Sean Gaffney, The Monitor
McALLEN - A push by U.S. and Mexican authorities to combat the high-powered arms trafficking that fuels Mexico's bloody drug war is putting increasing numbers of suspected drug smugglers in court.

Prosecutions for federal gun law violations are on pace to reach a 20-year high in South Texas as federal agents work to stem the "iron river of guns" that officials estimate supply 90 percent of the weapons used by the cartels.

The push is stretching the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives' 135 agents along the 2,000-mile border who are tasked with monitoring some 6,700 licensed gun dealers. In Texas the legal shops offer a buffet of high-powered automatic rifles, some of which have been used to kill thousands in drug-related violence this year.

"There's no other source for guns," said Francesca Perot, a Houston-based ATF spokeswoman. "It's not rocket science - it's cliché. The weapons come from here."

ATF-led prosecutions are expected to increase nearly 30 percent this year in the U.S. District Court's Southern District of Texas, a trend attributable to the January expansion of Project Gunrunner, according to interviews with officials and data compiled by the Syracuse University-based Transactional Records Clearing House.

With Project Gunrunner, a cooperative effort between U.S. and Mexican authorities to combat the flow of weapons, the ATF expanded its national firearms tracing software in January to nine U.S. consulates across the border. With more trace data from Mexican authorities on a timelier basis, agents naturally have pursued more smuggling rings, said Dan Aguirre, director of the McAllen ATF office.

Initiative is a key element of every investigation and has helped push the number of prosecutions in South Texas to 284 in a year when the agency's total prosecutions are down by nearly 2 percent from last year.

Much of that effort is geared toward targeting straw purchasers who are tapped by the cartels to obtain guns legally. The syndicates routinely target the poor and desperate to buy the guns for them in exchange for a fee, officials said.

Mexican national Juan Jose Escobedo-Taquin told investigators in January 2007 that he smuggled guns just to make money, according to court records.

He recruited a friend, 34-year-old Raul Ramirez, to help purchase the weapons and reportedly paid him $300 to $400 per gun, the records state. Both men pleaded guilty to their involvement in the operation and were sentenced to one year in prison.

Texas, with some of the most lax gun laws in the country, is considered one of the top source states for smuggled weapons. In February, William Hoover, ATF assistant director for field operations, testified before Congress that 90 percent of weapons U.S. authorities traced and found in Mexico were of U.S. origin.

Stemming straw purchases, officials say, is the crux of their enforcement efforts. The most visible aspect of that effort is an aggressive media blitz dubbed "Don't Lie for the Other Guy," which warns straw buyers of a 10-year federal prison sentence if convicted.

Once that initial purchase is made, officials said, gun smugglers pressure straw buyers to obtain more guns and even threaten violence if their request is denied, McAllen ATF agent Aguirre said.

"People have been approached at college, people have been approached at a club, people have been approached at the gym," Aguirre said. "Once they buy one gun, then they're hooked."


On Jan. 7, hundreds of U.S.-made bullet casings littered the streets of Rio Bravo - across the border from Donna - hours after Mexican military and federal police battled suspected drug cartels in the town. The firefight left three federal officers and three suspected cartel members dead and five soldiers and five federal officers injured.

Following the shooting, Mexican police arrested 10 cartel members who they said were armed with a plethora of U.S.-made high-powered rifles, including AK-47s and AR-15s.

The next day, cartels battled authorities again in downtown Reynosa, killing two federal police officers in apparent retaliation for the Rio Bravo attack.

Mexican Attorney General Medina Mora said in a written statement that week that members of the Tamaulipas-based Gulf Cartel were responsible for both attacks, adding the violence was a response to President Felipe Calderon's repudiated campaign against drug traffickers.

The Mexican government is reportedly spending some $3.9 billion a year to fight the cartels. Officials in that country have repeatedly urged U.S. authorities to take a stronger offensive against arms smuggling, cautioning Mexico's efforts make little difference when there's a steady stream of weapons.

Jose Luis Santiago Vasconcelos, Mexico's deputy federal attorney general for international affairs, told an audience at a May border security conference Austin that the smuggling is worth an estimated $10 billion a year.


In January, ATF agents indicted five men on federal gun charges after a nearly yearlong investigation in which confidential informants repeatedly purchased high-powered guns and drugs, according to court records.

In February, the bureau arrested five Starr County men - including a father and his two sons - for selling undercover agents silencers and machine guns with filed-off serial numbers - evidence the guns were destined for Mexican gangs.

The flow of weapons is ceaseless, officials say. The ATF is already looking to reopen a satellite office in Brownsville because of the inundation.

The agency is also looking to the Merida Initiative, a law enforcement aid package President Bush signed June 30 that will provide some $465 million to Mexico for training and equipment for taking on the drug cartels. It also will increase funding to develop a Spanish-language version of the United States' national gun registry - a move officials say will streamline tracing operations and lead to more investigations.


http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/articl ... _high.html

The Mexican government is reportedly spending some $3.9 billion a year to fight the cartels. Officials in that country have repeatedly urged U.S. authorities to take a stronger offensive against arms smuggling, cautioning Mexico's efforts make little difference when there's a steady stream of weapons.

And when will Mexico take a stronger offensive action against drug and illegal alien smuggling into the U.S.?

When will Mexico reduce its 50 consulates and fleet of moble consulates in the U.S. to a resonable number, stop issuing the bogus Matricula Consular ID cards, and stop meddling in U.S. government laws and policies?

A closed border would deter weapons, drugs, and illegal alien smuggling!