More than $500K of meth stashed in sedan nabbed at border

SAN DIEGO — More than $500,000 worth of methamphetamine stashed in a vehicle crossing into the U.S. last week at the Calexico East Port of Entry was intercepted by U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers, the agency said.

Just before 3:30 p.m. May 11, a 19-year-old driver in a 2015 Nissan Versa applied for admission into the country from Mexico at the port, according to Javier Garcia of the CBP San Diego office. When the officer inspecting the driver’s vehicle noticed “tampering” on its carpet and bolts on the seat frame, the vehicle was referred for further inspection.

Garcia said a human/narcotic detector dog alerted officers to the sedan and an inspection machine later found “anomalies in the vehicle’s floors, seats and rear quarter panels.”

Upon a search, officers came away with 35 packages of meth concealed in the vehicle. In total, the packages weighed more than 262 pounds with an estimated street value of $576,598.

Both the drugs and vehicles then were seized by the agency, Garcia said, and the driver was turned over to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Homeland Security Investigations.

Thus far in 2022, CBP officers have seized more than 390,000 pounds of illegal drugs, including 100,000 pounds of meth, agency data shows. That total includes nearly 74,000 pounds seized at San Diego ports, the vast majority of which has been meth.