Free Republic

The latest threat assessment prepared for special border enforcement teams says pleasure boats are among the increasingly inventive means used by crafty couriers to slip illicit cargo — including drugs, guns and people — from one country to the other. The marine environment “is viewed as particularly vulnerable and porous to smuggling activity” due to the many challenges in keeping tabs on lakes, waterways and tiny coves, says the August 2007 report, obtained by The Canadian Press under the Access to Information Act. One American criminal group has children carrying bags of tobacco swim across the St. Croix River between...

Cigarette smuggling is generating millions of dollars every year that can be reaching terrorist groups, including Hezbollah, Hamas and Al Qaeda, according to law enforcement sources. In a single case, $100,000 was sent to Hezbollah. A 15-page report congressional report includes intelligence from law enforcement as well as New York State’s Department of Taxation and Finance. Cigarette smuggling is generating millions of dollars every year that can be reaching terrorist groups, including Hezbollah, Hamas and Al Qaeda, according to law enforcement sources. In a single case, $100,000 was sent to Hezbollah. One of the key issues... is a potential flaw...

WASHINGTON — Stolen and sensitive U.S. military equipment, including fighter jet parts wanted by Iran and nuclear biological protective gear, has been available to the highest bidder on popular Internet sales sites, according to congressional investigators. Using undercover identities, investigators purchased a dozen defense-related items on the auction site eBay and the online network Craigslist from January 2007 through last month and received the items "no questions asked." The Defense Department regards much of the stolen equipment to be on the U.S. Munitions List, meaning there are restrictions on their overseas sales, the Government Accountability Office said Thursday. The equipment...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Stolen and sensitive U.S. military equipment, including fighter jet parts wanted by Iran and nuclear biological protective gear, has been available to the highest bidder on popular Internet sales sites, according to congressional investigators. Using undercover identities, investigators purchased a dozen defense-related items on the auction site eBay and the online network Craigslist from January 2007 through last month and received the items "no questions asked." The Defense Department regards much of the stolen equipment to be on the U.S. Munitions List, meaning there are restrictions on their overseas sales, the Government Accountability Office said Thursday. The...

EL PASO — Customs agents found nearly $1.9 million hidden in the doors of a sport utility vehicle at an El Paso port of entry, U.S. Customs and Border Protection announced on Tuesday. Agents found the cash, wrapped in bundles and hidden in the doors of a 1992 Ford Expedition, after using a density meter to inspect the vehicle Monday morning, CBP spokesman Roger Maier said. "The driver was a little bit nervous, a little bit shaky," Maier said. "So the agents used ... a density meter. It registered higher than normal, consistent with contraband. They started looking closer at...

Savvy criminals are using some of the country's most credible logos, including FedEx, Wal-Mart, DirecTV and the U.S. Border Patrol, to create fake trucks to smuggle drugs, money and illegal aliens across the border, according to a report by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. Termed "cloned" vehicles, the report also warns that terrorists could use the same fake trucks to gain access to secure areas with hidden weapons. The report says criminals have been able to easily obtain the necessary vinyl logo markings and signs for $6,000 or less. Authorities say "cosmetically cloned commercial vehicles are not illegal." In...

AN attempt to arrest federal prison guards in a sex-for-contraband probe erupted in gunfire that killed a US Justice Department agent and one of the guards, the FBI said today. Agents were trying to arrest six guards at the Federal Detention Centre in Tallahassee on charges including giving prisoners alcohol and other contraband in exchange for sex and money, an investigator said. One of the indicted guards opened fire and was shot dead, FBI spokesman Jeff Westcott said. An agent from the Justice Department's Office of the Inspector General was also killed, he said. Another prison worker was shot and...

435 cases of smokes, more than $1.3 million in cash, property seized in raids.Hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of property, cash and contraband cigarettes have been seized as a result of raids this week across Western Quebec and Eastern Ontario. At a press conference at the Quebec provincial police Gatineau detachment, investigators today provided more detail about Project Bleutte, which was first announced Thursday after raids were conducted throughout the region. Police said today the raids netted 435 cases of contraband cigarettes and they seized: 37 vehicles allegedly used for smuggling and distribution of the smokes, $600,000 in real...

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) - A man has pleaded guilty to conspiring to funnel money, weapons and supplies to the Hezbollah terrorist group and will testify against other defendants, prosecutors said Monday. Said Mohamad Harb, 31, pleaded guilty to conspiracy Feb. 25 and a charge of providing material support to a known terrorist organization was dropped, U.S. Attorney Robert Conrad said. Harb's trial had been scheduled to begin in two weeks. Conrad said the plea was kept secret because Harb agreed to testify against other defendants in exchange for the removal of some of his relatives from Lebanon to the United...

. . . Undercover federal agents, working with confidential informants, posed as black-market suppliers of the cigarettes. They also filled orders for Enfamil infant formula and EBT (food-stamp) cards that were used to buy merchandise that was resold at local convenience stores, according to court records. The sting resulted in the prosecution of nearly two dozen people, most of whom were indicted Wednesday on charges that they participated in a conspiracy that operated in an underground market for cigarettes. The indictment alleges they conspired to receive, transport, possess, sell and distribute about 9.6 million cigarettes [. . .] The arrests...

Kirsty Scott Thursday August 25, 2005 The Guardian Police are trying to reunite numerous garden gnomes with their owners after discovering an "Aladdin's cave" of ornaments during a raid on a house in Alloa. Officers investigating complaints that gnomes, plant pots and animal figures were disappearing from gardens across central Scotland raided the house in Clackmannanshire and found more than 40 ornaments, including rabbits, hedgehogs, birds, frogs and a terrier. A total of 62 plant pots and 25 solar lights were also recovered, together with a decorative wheelbarrow. Central Scotland police said there had been a spate of reported thefts...

A man gave up $123,850 and the 1999 Ford Windstar van he was driving to the Cleveland County Interstate Criminal Enforcement Team Thursday afternoon. The enforcement team, made up of regular sheriff's deputies who patrol the county's highways and I-85, pull over speeders and others violating traffic laws. But, in the midst of these regular pullovers, they're trained to spot suspicious items in order to find contraband. In the case of Thursday's incident, officers pulled over the southbound van on a routine traffic stop on I-85 near mile marker 2 and found a hidden compartment with the money in it,...

ALBANY, May 26 - As they move to thwart the illegal trade of cigarettes over the Internet, state officials have joined colleagues from around the nation in persuading the major credit card companies to stop processing payments for online cigarette sales. Additionally, the state has enacted a law prohibiting the shipment of cigarettes to its residents and banned private carriers, like FedEx, from shipping cigarettes. But as state officials fight illegal online cigarette sales, one operation is not falling into line - the United States Postal Service, which officials say delivers the bulk of illegally purchased cigarettes to New Yorkers....

(Hammond) - Federal authorities say that two Hoosiers are part of an illegal cigarette ring. The US Attorney's office says 20 people have been charged as part of a ring that acquired cigarettes in Indiana then sold them across the border in Illinois without paying taxes. The suspects were arrested Tuesday. Authorities say the people acquired more than three million cigarettes in Indiana and then sold them in Illinois where taxes on cigarette sales are significantly higher. Each of the defendants was charged with five federal counts of shipping and selling contraband cigarettes. The two from northwest Indiana are 40-year-old...

Snuffling among the bags coming into Los Angeles International Airport, Hunter went right to work, searching for hidden contraband. Almost immediately, he sat down next to a bag and pointed at it with his nose to alert his handler. With a little prodding, the passenger, who had just disembarked from a flight from Taiwan, produced the forbidden item. An apple. It's not your typical contraband, but then Hunter isn't your typical search dog. About a foot tall, with floppy ears and a sweet disposition, he's a member of the Beagle Brigade, a team of dogs and handlers charged with patrolling...

Explicit magazines, personal photographs will become illegal By Mike Ward AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF Saturday, April 3, 2004 State officials on Friday approved a policy that bans all sexually explicit images from Texas' prisons for the first time in decades. No more Hustler. No more Playboy. No more naked, thinking-of-you photos from a girlfriend or boyfriend. "Under this new rule, they're gone," said Gary Johnson, executive director of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. "We're trying to change the culture in our institutions -- to a better culture for our staff, especially the female correctional officers, a better culture for the inmates...

Court Allows Arrests of All in Drug Stops WASHINGTON (AP) - The Supreme Court issued a traffic warning Monday: Beware of whom you ride with. If drugs are found in a vehicle, all occupants can be arrested, the justices said in a unanimous decision. It was a victory for Maryland and 20 other states that argued police frequently find drugs in traffic stops but no one in the vehicle claims them. The court gave officers the go-ahead to arrest everyone. In a small space like a car, an officer could reasonably infer "a common enterprise" among a driver and passengers,...

On 13 June, a Thai national was arrested in Bangkok with a large quantity - reportedly 30kg - of caesium-137, a radioactive isotope that could be used in a radiological weapon (a so-called 'dirty bomb'). Narong Penanam confessed he had smuggled the radioactive material into Thailand from neighbouring Laos. He was detained in a sting operation by officers posing as potential buyers. It is believed that the suspect's intended customers - possibly the Southeast Asian terrorist network Jemaah Islamiah - were planning to target US interests in Thailand, perhaps the embassy or other diplomatic premises. US customs officials had asked...

SAIC [Science Applications International Corp.] sold two Mobile VACIS trucks to the Department of the Army-SECOM. The Mobile Vehicle and Cargo Inspection System (VACIS) is a truck-mounted gamma-ray imaging system designed to non-intrusively inspect the contents of trucks, containers, cargo and passenger vehicles for explosive devices and/or contraband. Each Mobile VACIS truck contains one 1.6 Ci Cs-137 sealed source. The trucks were to be shipped first, then the Cs-137 sealed sources were to be shipped later. However on September 30, 2002, the trucks were shipped with the sealed sources inside by mistake without the proper DOT paperwork and marking/labeling. This...