Meth, heroin smuggling edging into Valley market

Mexican drug violence and recent law enforcement crackdowns elsewhere on the border may be shifting the drug smuggling landscape in the Rio Grande Valley, a recent law enforcement report suggests.

Seizures of Mexican-produced methamphetamine and heroin - once rare in southernmost Texas - have increased dramatically over the past year, according to statistics gathered by the National Drug Intelligence Center in a study released earlier this month.

Meth seized in Hidalgo and Cameron counties increased more than eightfold between 2007 and 2008, while the amount of heroin seized rose nearly 72 percent.

"This shift may be the result of (drug trafficking organizations) seeking to avoid the violence prone smuggling corridors of Tijuana, Baja California and Ciudád Juarez," the center's South Texas High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area threat assessment states.

Meth Spike

In 2008, authorities working in Hidalgo County seized more than 713 pounds of meth as opposed to nearly 91 pounds the year before, according to the HIDTA report. Cameron County's numbers rose from just under 10 pounds to just under 200 pounds over the same period.

Nearly 30 percent of Hidalgo County's total last year came from a single drug bust, when McAllen police uncovered 211 pounds of meth, 18 pounds of black tar heroin and 29 pounds of cocaine at a home on the 4900 block of West Walnut Avenue. Police estimated the drugs had a combined street value of more than $5 million.

"The size of the seizure was very significant," McAllen police Chief Victor Rodriguez said. "But the additional factor that was unusual was that one of the suspects we arrested had come from Baja California," on Mexico's west coast.

This year, authorities reached nearly half the 2008 sum with a May seizure at the Pharr-Reynosa International Bridge, where customs agents found 340 pounds of meth in a tractor-trailer carrying a commercial shipment of carrots.

Explaining the Increase

The U.S. Border Patrol has also reported a recent spike in marijuana seizures, to the tune of a 140 percent increase over this time last year, but the pungent crop has always been a staple of the Valley drug trafficking trade.

Large quantities of meth and heroin are newer to the scene. And pinning down the exact explanation for their appearance has proven difficult, law enforcement officials said.

Some, such as the drug intelligence center, argue conditions in Mexico may be affecting smuggling patterns.

Since 2006, Mexican President Felipe Calderón has dispatched thousands of troops across his nation's northern border as drug cartels in western
Mexico battle authorities and each other for control over valuable smuggling routes through San Diego and El Paso. U.S. authorities have also increased the presence of antinarcotics forces along their nation's southern frontier.

This heightened federal presence on both sides has stretched into the Valley and northern Tamaulipas. But the Gulf Cartel - the predominant Mexican drug trafficking organization operating in the area - has managed to exert near complete control over routes from Ciudád Acuña, south of Del Rio, to
Matamoros on the Gulf Coast.

A lack of serious competition from rival groups has largely spared the region the drug-related violence seen further west and made South Texas a potentially lucrative smuggling ground for high-value contraband such as heroin and meth.

Other authorities point to the growth of Mexican meth laboratories over the past several years.

Production of meth sold in the United States has largely moved south of the border since 2006, when the federal government restricted sales of pseudophedrine, a powerful synthetic stimulant and primary ingredient in meth production commonly found in cold medicine.

"Meth production has not been associated with Mexico up until recently," McAllen's Chief Rodriguez said. "It is definitely a new pattern of activity fueled by their ability to get precursor drugs from Asia."

John Lopez, spokesman for the U.S. Border Patrol's Rio Grande Valley Sector, offers another explanation. The rising quantity of meth and heroin seized has more to do with the size of the loads smugglers are trying to sneak across than it has to do with the number of seizures occurring.

"Our law enforcement efforts are causing drug traffickers to feel the need to move their product all at once and more quickly," Lopez said. "They're starting to take drastic measures."