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 News from Around the Americas | February 2006 
Border Tunnelers Could Face 20 Years in Proposed Feinstein Bill
 Onell R. Soto - San Diego Union-Tribune
| | California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, left, and San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders look down at the exit end of a tunnel recently discovered in the Otay Mesa area of San Diego that was nearly a half mile long crossing over from Tijuana, Mexico. Sen. Feinstein is co-sponsoring legislation that would make tunnels under U.S. borders illegal. (AP Photo/Lenny Ignelzi) |
Surprisingly, it's not illegal to tunnel into the United States.
There are other crimes associated with border tunnels. It's illegal to enter the country someplace other than an official border crossing, for instance. Or to import drugs. And it's illegal to help others do these things.
But the tunneling itself? That's not against the law.
For now.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein said she plans to introduce legislation to change that when Congress reconvenes next week.
The California Democrat says she has Republican support for the bill, which would set a maximum 20-year sentence for building or financing a tunnel into the U.S.
Landowners who let others build or use such a tunnel would face up to 10 years in prison. And smugglers using a tunnel to move aliens, terrorists, weapons, drugs or other contraband would see their sentences doubled.
Today, Feinstein is scheduled to tour an Otay Mesa warehouse where investigators a month ago discovered the exit to a sophisticated tunnel extending a half-mile south to another warehouse in Tijuana.
We have got to throw the book at the criminals who would build these tunnels, Feinstein said.
Investigators in Mexico and the United States found more than two tons of marijuana in the tunnel, which they say is the work of a major drug cartel.
Feinstein isn't expected to tour the tunnel itself.
After taking a number of journalists and dignitaries into the tunnel in the days after it was discovered, agents brought in mining experts who deemed it unsafe despite its lighting, ventilation and water removal systems.
The tunnel was filling with groundwater about 4 inches a day, and efforts to keep it from flooding have been suspended.
Authorities have not decided what they will do with the tunnel, the longest ever discovered along the border.
Tunneling appears to have spiked in recent years, following bolstered border security after 9/11.
Eight tunnels between San Diego and Tijuana have been discovered this year, according to Feinstein's office.
That's part of the 40 tunnels her office counted since the 2001 terrorist attacks, all but one of them between the U.S.-Mexico border, according to her office. The other one was between British Columbia and Washington.
About a dozen such tunnels had been discovered between 1990 and 2001.
Few people are ever prosecuted in connection with tunnels. In part, that's because it's difficult to track down who is behind them, especially smaller ones agents call gopher holes.
Larger tunnels, such as the one Feinstein is visiting today, are a bit different. Agents are able to track down property records and examine forensic evidence such as computers and fingerprints.
A man who prosecutors said worked for a front company that rented the warehouse and was trying to purchase the 50,000-square-foot building has been arrested and is facing drug conspiracy charges.
He is in jail without bail.
Agents said few people are caught, in part, because cartel leaders and other higher-ups keep the foot soldiers at arms length. The people digging the tunnel may not know who they're working for.
And, in the past, those who know too much about a tunnel have been killed to prevent them from talking to authorities, federal officials said.
Feinstein said her bill will be co-sponsored by Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., chairman of the Senate Judiciary subcommittee on technology, terrorism and government Information. She is the top Democrat on that panel.
Onell Soto: (619) 293-1280; onell.soto@uniontrib.com |
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