https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/09/world/americas/fentanyl-us-mexico-route-cartel-smuggling.html
On both sides of the border, a network of lookouts and coordinators was working in sync, double-checking that every piece of the operation was in place. That included the most critical one: the U.S. border agent who, for a price, had agreed to let the vehicle through, cartel operatives said.
The driver said that the U.S. border agent would now receive tens of thousands of dollars for the warning alone, on top of the original payoff already promised for waving the car through the Mariposa Port of Entry in downtown Nogales.
His accusation could not be independently verified. But the driver and the mechanic both said the drugs had made it across the border — a sign of how deep the cartel’s reach ran.
The U.S. border agency, Customs and Border Protection, refers cases of possible corruption in its ranks to the Justice Department for investigation. Asked about accusations of agents taking bribes, the agency’s acting commissioner, Rodney S. Scott, said in a statement that “C.B.P. agents and officers risk their lives to defend you every day.”
The operative’s account also corresponds with findings by U.S. authorities who have documented the Sinaloa Cartel’s influence.
In April, a former U.S. Border Patrol agent was convicted of conspiring with two Mexican nationals to let vehicles pass through his lane without inspection, the U.S. attorney’s office for the district of Arizona said in April.
Federal prosecutors said the agent provided details to the Mexican individuals about checkpoint operations and cleared at least five vehicles in exchange for a promised cut of the smuggling fee — $20,000 of the $40,000 that the traffickers received.
抓一个，后面还有50个腐败贪官
比我想的要便宜一些
