Mexican Drug War 2014: ICE, Mexican Authorities Find Two Drug Tunnels At San Diego Border
Immigration and Customs Enforcement found two new border-crossing tunnels earlier this week, which runs through the Mexico-San Diego border. The discovery, announced on Friday, marks the sixth and seventh tunnels found in the last four years.
More than 80 tunnels have been found in California and Arizona since 2006, according to the Los Angeles Times.
ICE said the two tunnels were used for drug smuggling and called them sophisticated and elaborate.
The discovery was made Wednesday after ICE agents arrested 73-year-old Chula Vista woman, Glennys Rodriguez, on suspicion of overseeing the drug operation that used one of the tunnels that leads into an Otay Mesa industrial park in San Diego.
Rodriguez told authorities that the tunnel was purchased last May.
Mexican authorities found the second tunnel on Thursday but officials said it was much longer and more elaborate than the first tunnel, which was roughly 600 yards long and was secured with wooden bounds.
The first tunnel had lighting throughout and was equipped with a pulley system on the U.S. side used to hoist packages. The tunnels exit was 70-feet below ground, the Times reported.
Authorities also said that the second tunnel's exit was right around the corner from the first tunnel, was 700 yards long and had ventilation as well as an electrical rail system.
Drug Enforcement Administration Special Agent William Sherman of the San Diego branch said in a statement that the discovery prevented the smuggling of drugs worth millions of dollars.
The bust "eliminated a multi-million dollar drug smuggling venture and have reduced it to nothing more than a colossal waste of money on the part of the drug cartels," Sherman said. "Our goal is to not only shut these tunnels down before they become operational, but to ensure that the cartels backing these elaborate smuggling operations are investigated and prosecuted."
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