Testing It Up

Border Patrol drug busts often paint a picture of Mexicans smuggling banned substances into the United States. But according to a report released on March 26 by the Center for Investigative Reporting, the border agency actually catches more Americans transporting drugs into the country.

An analysis of records showed that four out of five people, or 80 percent, found with drugs by Border Patrol agents are U.S. citizens, even though 38 percent of the border agency’s press releases mentioned a Mexican drug-trafficking suspect.

Law enforcement officials and Americans who have been nabbed for drug possession said U.S. citizens are often recruited because traffickers believe they will arouse less suspicion from police.

One case involved a U.S. Naval Academy grad who already made five smuggling runs before he was caught at a checkpoint about 80 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border in December 2010.

Another case involved an unemployed mechanical engineer who had already made seventeen smuggling runs before a drug-sniffing dog found more than 80 pounds of marijuana stashed in his car in 2011.

The report also revealed that the number of Americans arrested with drugs by the Border Patrol in 2011 is three times more than in 2005.

Customs and Border Protection spokesman William Brooks said that while there were U.S. citizens involved in drug smuggling, many are still Mexicans. But the Border Patrol’s own records showed U.S. citizens are involved in drug trafficking of cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamine 60 percent more than any other nationality. For marijuana arrests of 1,000 pounds or more, the percentage climbs to more than two-thirds.

As the Border Patrol stepped up security by increasing agents and drug-detecting dogs at checkpoints to catch more smugglers, the traffickers also have changed tactics.

“They know the language. They know the culture. They know the routes,” said Hudspeth County Sheriff’s Office spokesman Rusty Fleming. “And the traffickers have learned the art of breaking down the risk.”

The wife of South Africa’s intelligence minister had been arrested for on the charge that she conspired to bring cocaine into the country. Sheryl Cwele, the 50-year-old wife of Siyabonga Ms. Cwele was charged with securing a woman to gather drugs in Turkey and getting another woman to smuggle cocaine from Brazil. Ms Cwele shares these charges with Frank Nabolis, a Nigerian national who was arrested in South Africa in December. For the moment she’s still in police custody awaiting a bail application hearing.

Cwele’s arrest followed that of Tessa Beetge, a South African woman who was arrested in Brazil in 2008 with 22lb of cocaine hidden inside of her luggage. Beetge was sentenced to eight years in prison for her part in the drug smuggling. Several reports linked Ms Cwele to Ms. Beetge before she went on leave in from her job as director for health and community services at the Hibiscus Coast Municipality in December. She’d returned to work and was arrested at her office before she appeared at Pietermaritzburg High Court. The National Prosecuting Authority in South Africa states that Ms. Cwele faces one count of dealing in dangerous dependency-producing drugs and two counts of incitement to dealing in dangerous dependency-producing drugs, dating back to as far back as May and June 2008. Mr. Cwele has told local media that he was unaware of his wife’s alleged drug dealings.

British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, has expressed strong reactions over the execution of a British national in China on charges of drug smuggling yesterday morning.

‘I condemn the execution of Akmal Shaikh in the strongest terms and am appalled and disappointed that our persistent requests for clemency have not been granted,’ the Prime Minister said.

The days and weeks leading up to the December 29 execution were spent pleading with Chinese authorities to spare 53-year-old British citizen Akmal Shaikh, who was charged with smuggling drugs into China. He was caught coming into China in September 2007 with 9 pounds of heroin, and was executed on December 29 in Urumqi in the northwestern province of Xinjiang. He is the first European to be executed in half a century.

The British government has tried to intervene in the case as Shaikh’s family repeatedly claimed that he suffered from bipolar disorder. This claim was corroborated by independent assessments from social workers in Poland. Shaikh had been living in Poland before flying to China.

According to an interview by BBC with Shaikh’s daughter Leilla Hornsell, her father had been convinced by drug smugglers in Poland that they would turn him into a pop star in China while singing about world peace. He was then given a suitcase to carry to China and allegedly had no knowledge that he was carrying drugs into the country.

Amnesty International was quoted with the following statement: “Under international human rights law, as well as Chinese law, a defendant’s mental health can and should be taken into account.” China, however, insists that Shaikh had been given a fair trial and that drug smuggling was a grave crime that will not be dealt with lightly.

The British Foreign Office reportedly summoned Chinese ambassador Fu Ying for a meeting with Foreign Office minister Ivan Lewis “to hear of the government’s regret that Akmal Shaikh’s mental health had been ignored by the Chinese judiciary despite repeated interventions by those with an interest in his case”.

One of the groups that may be profiting from the cocaine trade may turn out to be one of the groups that aim to spark terror in the world.

Three men believed to have ties with Al Qaeda and Osama Bin Laden were charged before federal court in New York. The men were accused of attempting to smuggle cocaine, and were arrested during a sting operation staged by the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) in Ghana.

There is allegedly an 18-page complaint that discusses a web of mafia and terrorist activity in Northwestern Africa and is now causing increasing alarm among European, African and U.S. investigators.

West Africa reportedly saw a rise in cocaine traffic over the last few years. The area is now believed to have been turned into a hub by the Latin American Mafia where cocaine passes through as it journeys through the Atlantic into the profitable European drug market.

An Al Qaeda cell in the Maghreb region is reportedly engaged in the smuggling of cocaine through routes that cross the Sahara. Part of their income allegedly comes from providing protection and participating in the moving of illegal substances through “smuggling corridors” that pass through Morocco into Spain and by way of Libya and Algeria into Italy.

Having such ties may have one consequence that has authorities worried; profits gained from such trade may be used to finance terrorist attacks in the West. As an example, the train bombings in Madrid in 2004 were said to have been financed by North Africans with Al Qaeda connections who earned the money dealing hashish and Ecstasy.

Authorities were quick to clarify, however, that the three suspects were not members of Al Qaeda themselves, but are believed to have connections with the group.

New York Drug Screening