Insight drugs series shakes Customs Service

0 Comments | Insight on the News, May 19, 1997 | by Jamie Dettmer

Seven or more trucking companies approved by U.S. Customs' bosses to be waved through the border are owned by suspected traffickers, authorities report. Others are believed to be involved in smuggling.

Enraged U.S. Customs chiefs have launched a major internal-affairs, or IA, probe in California in a bid to identify and possibly prosecute sources who have helped Insight with its ongoing investigative series, "Border Wars."

The probe's immediate objective is to find who leaked to Insight and CBS' 60 Minutes a June 1996 memo purportedly signed by Customs' San Diego District Commissioner Rudy M. Camacho that "encourages" inspectors to process "as quickly as possible" border-crossing trucks belonging to a firm owned by the alleged narcotrafficking Zaragoza Fuentes family (see "U.S. Drug Warriors Knock on Heaven's Door," April 21).

The IA probe appears to be part of an all-out effort by Customs officials to contain the mounting political fallout from Insight's series and, in particular, to stop a flood of embarrassing leaks that illustrate the ease with which Mexican narcotraffickers use legitimate transport companies to smuggle cocaine and other narcotics across the border and through American ports of entry.

It is the third time during the last six months that Customs has attempted to ferret out Insight sources: In November 1996, a former Customs informant was arrested under curious circumstances; in March, IA agents unleashed a witch-hunt in Arizona looking for whistle-blowers who had revealed lax management at the Douglas port of entry (see "Battle for the Border," Dec. 9, 1996, and "Exposed Border Bosses Embarrass U.S. Customs," March 24).

Since November Insight has disclosed details of Mexican drug-smuggling operations and narcotics-related bribery probes of U.S. officials along the Southwest border. The magazine also has reported on allegations of serious mismanagement against, among others, Camacho, Jerry Martin, former San Ysidro port director; Art Gilbert, former supervising inspector at San Ysidro, and Frank Amarillas, Douglas port director. As a result of the reports, according to sources, Martin was transferred and Gilbert is fighting attempts to remove him from Customs. The biggest casualty so far came on April 15 when Customs Commissioner George Weise bowed to congressional pressure and announced he will step down this summer. Congressional frustration is unlikely to subside any time soon.

Ironically, a truck linked to California Gas Transport, the Zaragoza Fuentes-owned firm that received Camacho's backing in the June memo, was seized at a Mexican Federal Judicial Police checkpoint in the state of Tamaulipas on April 24 after being found to be carrying more than 6 metric tons of cocaine. Mexican officials initially claimed the huge seizure -- the biggest by the Mexican police since 1993 -- resulted from a routine road check. Later they acknowledged to Notimex, the Mexican press agency, that they have been keeping a closer eye on trucking firms owned by the Zaragoza Fuentes family since the American media focused on the gang. Some U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, or DEA, sources suspect the seizure may have been what is known in drug circles as a "giveaway." As one of these sources observes, "It strikes me as odd -- the truck was a long way from the border. I'm just wondering if the Mexican police needed a load to take the heat off from their political bosses."

Further problems loom for Customs. Insight has learned that several Mexican firms owned by known or suspected narcotraffickers are participants in Customs' own Cargo Carrier Initiative Program, or CCIP -- a 10-year-old scheme much favored by Weise -- alleged to facilitate trade. This program allows approved trucking companies and other import-export businesses to avoid much red tape at U.S. ports of entry. Participants in the program -- they are meant to be checked out thoroughly before being accepted -- are able to get their trucks through Customs rapidly. In fact, their vehicles generally can skip most inspections. Instead, the trucks and tankers from firms that qualify are given a thorough inspection only three out of every 100 times they cross the border, with a partial inspection 38 of every 100 crossings, according to Customs officials.

Critics argue that's not enough and contend that U.S. officials don't conduct thorough background checks of the businesses taking part in this open-portal policy. An informal survey conducted by Insight of the 1996 "approved CCIP signatories" list has found that indeed that may be the case. Seven of the 123 trucking companies approved as CCIP participants are owned by suspected traffickers or money-launderers, according to Customs' own intelligence database, the Treasury and Enforcement Computer System, or TECS. Still other owners are believed by the DEA and other U.S. law-enforcement agencies to be involved in drug smuggling. One company, Pacifica Transportation Inc., owned by Manuel Marin, who is alleged in TECS to be a class-one narcotrafficker, even was the subject of a March 1994 NBC Dateline expose. Despite that, however, Marin's firm appears to have slipped through Customs' checks.