SAN DIEGO — At first, Luis F. Alarid seemed well on his way to
becoming a customs agency success story. He had risen from a childhood
of poverty and foster homes, some of them abusive, earned praise and
commendations while serving in the Army and the Marines, including two tours in Iraq, and returned to Southern California to fulfill a goal of serving in law enforcement.
But, early last year, after just a few months as a customs inspector, he was waving in trucks from Mexico carrying loads of marijuana
and illegal immigrants. He pocketed some $200,000 in cash that paid
for, as far as the government could tell, a $15,000 motorcycle,
flat-screen televisions, a laptop computer and more.
Some investigators believe that Mr. Alarid, 32, who was paid off by a Mexican smuggling crew that included several members of his family, intended to work for smugglers all along. At one point, Mr. Alarid, who was sentenced to seven years in federal prison in February, told investigators that he had researched just how much prison time he might get for his crimes and believed, as investigators later reported, that he could do it “standing on his head.”
Mr. Alarid’s case is not the only one that has law enforcement officials worried that Mexican traffickers — facing beefed-up security on the border that now includes miles of new fencing, floodlights, drones, motion sensors and cameras — have stepped up their efforts to corrupt the border police.
They research potential targets, anticorruption investigators said, exploiting the cross-border clans and relationships that define the region, offering money, sex, whatever it takes. But, with the border police in the midst of a hiring boom, law enforcement officers believe that traffickers are pulling out the stops, even soliciting some of their own operatives to apply for jobs.
“In some ways,” said Keith Slotter, the agent in charge of the F.B.I.’s San Diego office, “it’s like the old spy game between the old Soviet Union and the U.S. — trying to compromise each other’s spies.”
James Tomsheck, the assistant commissioner for internal affairs at Customs and Border Protection, and other investigators said they had seen many signs that the drug organizations were making a concerted effort to infiltrate the ranks.
“We are very concerned,” Mr. Tomsheck said. “There have been verifiable instances where people were directed to C.B.P. to apply for positions only for the purpose of enhancing the goals of criminal organizations. They had been selected because they had no criminal record; a background investigation would not develop derogatory information.”
During a federal trial of a recently hired Border Patrol agent this year, one drug trafficker with ties to organized crime in Mexico described how he had enticed the agent, a close friend from high school in Del Rio, Tex., who was entering the training academy, to join his crew smuggling tons of marijuana into Texas.
The agent, Raquel Esquivel, 25, was sentenced to 15 years in prison last week for tipping smugglers on where border guards were and suggesting how they could avoid getting caught.
The smuggler, Diego Esquivel, who is not related to the agent, said he told her that her decision to enter the academy was a good career move and, he said, “I thought it was good for me, too.”
Under the Bush administration, the United States has spent billions of dollars — $11 billion this year alone for Customs and Border Protection — to tighten the border between the United States and Mexico, building up physical barriers and going on a hiring spree to develop the nation’s largest law enforcement agency to patrol the area.
But the battle for survival among cartels in Mexico, in which thousands of people, mostly in the drug trade or fighting it, have been killed, has only led drug traffickers to redouble their efforts to get their drugs to market in the United States.
Along the border, many residents have family members on both sides. Generations of residents have been accustomed to passing back and forth relatively freely, often daily, and exchanging goods, legal or not.
Federal officials believe that drug traffickers are seeking to exploit those ties more than ever, urging family and friends on the American side to take advantage of the hiring rush for customs agents. The majority of agents and officers stay out of crime. But smuggling can be appealing. The average officer makes $70,000 a year, a sum that can be dwarfed by what smugglers pay to get just a few trucks full of drugs into the United States.
Michael Stravato for The New York Times
Security on the border with Mexico has been beefed up. Traffic streamed across the bridge linking El Paso and Ciudad Juárez.
War Without Borders
This series examines the impact of Mexican drug cartels on both sides of the border.
Previous Articles in the Series »
Department of Homeland Security
Margarita Crispin, a former customs inspector in El Paso, pleaded guilty in one of the more egregious corruption cases.
Some investigators believe that Mr. Alarid, 32, who was paid off by a Mexican smuggling crew that included several members of his family, intended to work for smugglers all along. At one point, Mr. Alarid, who was sentenced to seven years in federal prison in February, told investigators that he had researched just how much prison time he might get for his crimes and believed, as investigators later reported, that he could do it “standing on his head.”
Mr. Alarid’s case is not the only one that has law enforcement officials worried that Mexican traffickers — facing beefed-up security on the border that now includes miles of new fencing, floodlights, drones, motion sensors and cameras — have stepped up their efforts to corrupt the border police.
They research potential targets, anticorruption investigators said, exploiting the cross-border clans and relationships that define the region, offering money, sex, whatever it takes. But, with the border police in the midst of a hiring boom, law enforcement officers believe that traffickers are pulling out the stops, even soliciting some of their own operatives to apply for jobs.
“In some ways,” said Keith Slotter, the agent in charge of the F.B.I.’s San Diego office, “it’s like the old spy game between the old Soviet Union and the U.S. — trying to compromise each other’s spies.”
James Tomsheck, the assistant commissioner for internal affairs at Customs and Border Protection, and other investigators said they had seen many signs that the drug organizations were making a concerted effort to infiltrate the ranks.
“We are very concerned,” Mr. Tomsheck said. “There have been verifiable instances where people were directed to C.B.P. to apply for positions only for the purpose of enhancing the goals of criminal organizations. They had been selected because they had no criminal record; a background investigation would not develop derogatory information.”
During a federal trial of a recently hired Border Patrol agent this year, one drug trafficker with ties to organized crime in Mexico described how he had enticed the agent, a close friend from high school in Del Rio, Tex., who was entering the training academy, to join his crew smuggling tons of marijuana into Texas.
The agent, Raquel Esquivel, 25, was sentenced to 15 years in prison last week for tipping smugglers on where border guards were and suggesting how they could avoid getting caught.
The smuggler, Diego Esquivel, who is not related to the agent, said he told her that her decision to enter the academy was a good career move and, he said, “I thought it was good for me, too.”
Under the Bush administration, the United States has spent billions of dollars — $11 billion this year alone for Customs and Border Protection — to tighten the border between the United States and Mexico, building up physical barriers and going on a hiring spree to develop the nation’s largest law enforcement agency to patrol the area.
But the battle for survival among cartels in Mexico, in which thousands of people, mostly in the drug trade or fighting it, have been killed, has only led drug traffickers to redouble their efforts to get their drugs to market in the United States.
Along the border, many residents have family members on both sides. Generations of residents have been accustomed to passing back and forth relatively freely, often daily, and exchanging goods, legal or not.
Federal officials believe that drug traffickers are seeking to exploit those ties more than ever, urging family and friends on the American side to take advantage of the hiring rush for customs agents. The majority of agents and officers stay out of crime. But smuggling can be appealing. The average officer makes $70,000 a year, a sum that can be dwarfed by what smugglers pay to get just a few trucks full of drugs into the United States.
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A version of this article appeared in print on December 18, 2009, on page A1 of the New York edition.
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