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No Holidays for Drug Smugglers Caught in Nogales

Release Date
Thu, 01/05/2017

TUCSON, Ariz. – Customs and Border Protection officers arrested two people two days before Christmas for separate attempts to smuggle a combined $224,000 worth of methamphetamine and heroin through the Port of Nogales.

Officers at the DeConcini crossing in Nogales removed more than 20 packages of meth and heroin from within the rocker panels of a smuggling vehicle
Officers at the DeConcini crossing removed
more than 20 packages of meth and heroin
from within the rocker panels of a smuggling
vehicle

Officers working with a CBP narcotics-detection canine at the Dennis DeConcini crossing on Dec. 23 found more than 19 pounds of meth and 9 nine pounds of heroin, worth more than $209,000, in the rocker panels of a Dodge hatchback driven by a 35-year-old Tucson woman.   

Later that night, officers at the Mariposa crossing stopped a 26-year-old man from Nogales, Sonora, Mexico, driving a Dodge truck. Instead of finding drugs in the vehicle, however, officers found 5 pounds of meth, worth approximately $15,000, strapped around the man’s midsection as well as around his calves.

Officers seized all drugs and vehicles, and turned both subjects over to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection is the unified border agency within the Department of Homeland Security charged with the management, control and protection of our nation's borders at and between the official ports of entry. CBP is charged with keeping terrorists and terrorist weapons out of the country while enforcing hundreds of U.S. laws.

Last Modified: Feb 03, 2021