Crime Correspondent: Brownsville

Esteban Garza, 33, was charged by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers with possession with intent to distribute 13.72 kilograms of cocaine

Esteban Garza, 33, was charged by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers with possession with intent to distribute 13.72 kilograms of cocaineThe arrest took place Sunday at 5:41 p.m. when Garza drove a 2001 Ford Explorer to an inspection booth. The suspect gave a negative declaration when asked if he had anything to declare and said that the vehicle belonged to a friend, the criminal complaint stated.The agency press release said Garza was sent to a secondary inspection station where other officers noticed possible tampering in an area behind the vehicle's backseat. Cisco, a narcotics detecting dog, was brought to the vehicle and confirmed the officers' suspicions by alerting them to the presence of drugs inside the vehicle, the release said. Field operations officers discovered 20 packages containing 13.72 kilograms. or over 30 pounds of cocaine valued at nearly $1million, authorities added. Garza was arrested by CBP and turned over to ICE for further investigation and prosecution.According to the criminal complaint, Garza was going to be paid $1,000 for transporting an unspecified amount of drugs into the U.S.

Esteban Garza, 33, was charged by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers with possession with intent to distribute 13.72 kilograms of cocaine

Esteban Garza, 33, was charged by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers with possession with intent to distribute 13.72 kilograms of ...

Jesus Rafael Larrazolo,claimed he was forced by threats to pick up the drugs, more than 60 pounds of cocaine, in Brownsville.

Jesus Rafael Larrazolo, who resigned from the Department of Public Safety after his Nov. 21 arrest, remained in custody following Wednesday...

Laura Trevino,Adriana Trevino,Evelia Trevino arrested for attempting to smuggle cocaine into the United States

A woman and her three daughters have been arrested for attempting to smuggle cocaine into the United States in what the port director called...

Texas court bailiff accused of peddling cocaine and selling guns to the Gulf Cartel

A Texas court bailiff accused of peddling cocaine and selling guns to the Gulf Cartel, two TSA officials indicted for helping to smuggle drugs onto airplanes, and a California evidence tech with sticky fingers and a bad habit. Just another week on the corrupt cop front. Let's get to it:In Brownsville, Texas, a Cameron County court bailiff was arrested last Friday on charges he was dealing cocaine and selling high-powered weapons to Mexico's Gulf Cartel. Oscar Pena, 26, was one of two men arrested after a five-month joint investigation by local authorities, the FBI, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) known as Operation Dirty Pig. His charges range from weapons charges to operating a continuing criminal enterprise to possession of cocaine. In raids associated with the arrests, police seized 14 assault rifles, five semi-automatic handguns, a sawed-off shotgun, large amounts of ammunition, a bullet-proof vest, $3,000 in cash, and more than a kilo of cocaine. In Atlanta, two Transportation Security Administration officers and a Delta Airlines employee were indicted Tuesday on charges related to an alleged drug-smuggling operation at the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. TSA employees Jon Patton, 44, and Andre Mays, 24, and Delta employee Leslie Adgar, 42, are charged with conspiring to distribute narcotics and attempted distribution of cocaine and heroin. They went down after they agreed to let a man smuggle two kilos of cocaine past security and onto a Delta flight to New York in exchange for $8,000 in December. Unfortunately for the Atlanta trio, their smuggler was also a snitch for the DEA who set them up for two more runs, this time with fake cocaine and heroin. The charges carry a maximum sentence of life in prison and a fine of up to $4 million. The trio are currently out on bond.In Vacaville, California, a former Solano County sheriff's evidence technician pleaded no-contest last Friday to seven felony counts related to the theft of pharmaceutical drugs stored in an evidence room. Sean Colfax Wilson, 35, was facing a 179-count criminal complaint when he copped a plea to two counts of possessing Vicodin and Oxycontin for sale, three counts of burglary, one count of embezzlement of evidence and one count of falsifying evidence. Wilson, who had worked as an evidence tech for the county for two years, was arrested in December 2007 after investigators discovered a large variety of prescription drugs had gone missing. After his arrest, Wilson's attorney told the court Wilson had a substance abuse problem and had taken the drugs for personal use, but he still copped to possession for sale. He faces an April sentencing date and he sits in jail until then.

Texas court bailiff accused of peddling cocaine and selling guns to the Gulf Cartel

A Texas court bailiff accused of peddling cocaine and selling guns to the Gulf Cartel, two TSA officials indicted for helping to smuggle dru...

Landín-Martinez ,Jose Moncerrat Narvaez,Ricardo Muñiz,Juan Oscar Garza-Alanis

<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0DZYRgd9lPinVJYiaCc_CBUzLurq_hN9GqKCVvjbOujHF2fLYNYfCIbON__gnEXbrOhUdjx03byFWum24qRFFDAdl4ElWGwU_idEKASs0ZWV5Zc4R4ijJvPSG3l3z-_EfpmgQy7yNdIw/s1600-h/po.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5156250387046133554" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0DZYRgd9lPinVJYiaCc_CBUzLurq_hN9GqKCVvjbOujHF2fLYNYfCIbON__gnEXbrOhUdjx03byFWum24qRFFDAdl4ElWGwU_idEKASs0ZWV5Zc4R4ijJvPSG3l3z-_EfpmgQy7yNdIw/s320/po.jpg" style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" /></a> “When one is in the drug business, one is afraid of many things,” he said in Spanish. “Most of all … death.” Landín-Martinez and 13 co-defendants face criminal charges specifically linked to several drug- and currency-smuggling busts between January 2005 and January 2007. Of those in custody, six have pleaded guilty and are cooperating in the government’s case. Three, including Landín-Martinez, have pleaded not guilty. McAllen police arrested Landín-Martinez on July 14, when an off-duty agent with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration spotted him shopping for watermelon at an H.E.B. supermarket on North 10th Street, south of Nolana in McAllen. Tuesday’s testimony outlined a complex criminal organization that kept its low-level members in the dark about the overall scope of operations even as it insulated those at the top from direct links to drug trafficking. “The money works in a chain of command,” said Ricardo Garza, a low-level smuggler in the organization. “You’ve got to pay for your services; you’ve got to pay for your supply. It works like that all the way to the top.” The group relied on middle-men like Jose Moncerrat Narvaez, 43, who testified Tuesday that he received drug shipments sent across the Rio Grande by a man named Juan Oscar Garza-Alanis. Using rafts, cars and even an underground drainage pipe connecting the river to a 23rd Street manhole in Hidalgo, men like Narvaez were responsible for guiding the drugs to a designated drop-off point. His employees usually took drug shipments from the river to the parking lots of McAllen businesses like McDonald’s, H.E.B. and Delia’s Tamales. From there, another organization under Landín-Martinez’s alleged umbrella would pick up the drugs and take them to stash houses across the city. Ricardo Muñiz, of Edinburg, ran one such operation. He told jurors Tuesday that he managed a group of smugglers that would then take the drugs past checkpoints in Falfurrias and Sarita in hopes of selling them to markets in the interior United States. Once the sales were made, his couriers would return with money that would be paid to Garza-Alanis, who worked directly for Landín-Martinez, in Reynosa, Muñiz said.

Landín-Martinez ,Jose Moncerrat Narvaez,Ricardo Muñiz,Juan Oscar Garza-Alanis

“When one is in the drug business, one is afraid of many things,” he said in Spanish. “Most of all … death.” Landín-Martinez and 13 co-defen...