A U.S. teenager was arrested by Border Patrol agents near Yuma, Arizona, early on Monday after allegedly collecting $26,000 worth of methamphetamines sent by drone from Mexico into the United States, a sign of the growing use of the aerial systems to smuggle drugs across the border.
The 17-year-old boy was waiting on the U.S. side of the border in the town of San Luis, Arizona, to retrieve the bundles as soon as they were dropped, according to U. S. Customs and Border Protection.
However, a nearby agent spotted the drone as it dropped several packages to a person in the distance. The agent responded, and a federal police dog alerted its handler to the smell of drugs within the suspect’s car, CBP said. Agents said they found nine packages of meth, weighing in at 12 pounds. The suspect was charged with drug possession.
The use of drones by cartels operating at the southern border is not new, but what started as a rare occurrence five years ago has become more constant. Between October 2014 and last month, Border Patrol agents observed 170 drones watching them or moving something over the border through the air, according to a spokesman for CBP, which oversees the patrol.
Drones lurk above agents who are on foot, in their vehicles, on an ATV, or on a horse. Mexican smugglers who are moving drugs or people use the devices to determine where agents are not present and can then send something or someone across the border without being detected. Other drones may be loaded with as much as a kilogram of narcotics and flown to the U.S. side. Then the drone can drop it for the next mover to pick up and transport deeper into the country.
The problem for agents is that drones can fly hundreds of feet overhead, which allows the unmanned aerial systems to go unseen, especially at night, and unheard. The agency knows they are a growing problem, but it is impossible to shoot them down with a gun, and they do not have the legal authority to use other measures to seize them.
Drone experts said lawmakers are to blame for holding hostage the procurement process because they cannot agree on what type of steps to take to address the issue. Republicans are largely following President Trump’s lead and have tried to obtain billions of dollars of funding to put up a steel bollard fence on the southern border.
Border Patrol has only seen one person involved in a drone drug-smuggling incident prosecuted due to the challenge involved in spotting the unmanned aircraft at night when they are most active.
