Huge cross-border tunnel found linking Tijuana, San Diego

SAN DIEGO (AP) — U.S. authorities on Monday introduced the invention of a major drug smuggling tunnel — working about the size of a six soccer fields — from Mexico to a warehouse in an industrial area within the U.S.

The secret passage from Tijuana to San Diego featured rail and ventilation techniques, electricity and bolstered partitions, authorities mentioned. It was found near San Diego’s Otay Mesa border crossing in an area the place more than a dozen other refined tunnels have been discovered in the last twenty years.

U.S. authorities said it was unknown how lengthy the tunnel had been operating and what amount of medicine, if any, obtained by undetected. They seized 1,762 kilos (799 kg) of cocaine, 165 kilos (75 kg) of meth and three.5 kilos (1.6 kg) of heroin in reference to the investigation.

Six folks, ages 31 to 55, were charged with conspiring to distribute cocaine. All are Southern California residents.

The tunnel is in one of the most fortified stretches of the border, illustrating the constraints of border partitions. Whereas considered effective towards small, crudely built tunnels referred to as “gopher holes,” walls are not any match for more sophisticated passages that run deeper underground.

The latest passage, discovered Friday, ran one-third of a mile (532 m) to Tijuana. It was 4 ft (1.2 m) in diameter and about six stories deep.

The kind of medicine seized may sign a shift from the multi-ton loads of marijuana that have been usually present in discoveries earlier than California legalized pot for recreational use in 2019.

Hard medication, equivalent to heroin, methamphetamine and fentanyl, are sometimes smuggled by way of official border crossings from Mexico as a result of their small dimension and lack of odor make them difficult to detect. But tunnels give smugglers an advantage of being able to carry large hundreds at lightning pace.

The tunnel exited the USA in a nondescript warehouse named “Amistad Park” on a avenue that is busy with large semitrailers during the day but quiet at night. On Monday, armed guards watched over a small shaft with a ladder that descended into the tunnel.

After staking out a home that was recently used to stash medication, officers began making traffic stops of autos that had been there or at a warehouse near the border, turning up boxes filled with cocaine, in keeping with a federal prison criticism filed in San Diego.

They raided the properties — discovering no other medicine at the warehouse, but a tunnel opening carved into the cement flooring, federal prosecutors said.

Authorities have discovered about 15 refined tunnels on California’s border with Mexico since 2006.

Many tunnels, together with the one announced Monday, are in San Diego’s Otay Mesa industrial space, where clay-like soil is conducive to digging and warehouses provide cover.

The cross-border passages date again to the early Nineteen Nineties and have been used primarily to smuggle multi-ton loads of marijuana. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration said in 2020 that they are generally present in California and Arizona and associated with Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel.

Authorities declined to hyperlink the newest tunnel to any particular cartel. They claimed victory despite not realizing how long it had been working.

“There is no such thing as a extra gentle on the end of this narco-tunnel,” stated Randy Grossman, U.S. legal professional for the Southern District of California. “We are going to take down each subterranean smuggling route we find to keep illicit drugs from reaching our streets and destroying our families and communities.”

By federal regulation, U.S. authorities must fill the U.S. side of tunnels with concrete after they are found.

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Associated Press writer Eugene Johnson in Seattle contributed.