4 arrested by Border Patrol in pot smuggling attempt

Two U.S. citizens and two Mexican citizens were arrested by the U.S. Border Patrol early Monday morning in Calexico after agents saw them attempting to smuggle marijuana into the United States from Mexico.

Around midnight, agents said they saw two men climb over the International Boundary Fence about one mile east of the Highway 98 and Interstate 8 junction.

After swimming across the All-American Canal, agents said one of the men ran north towards a car that was stopped on the shoulder of the eastbound lanes of Interstate 8. The man placed a bundle inside the car and the vehicle drove westbound at the Brock’s Research Center Road overpass.

Authorities followed the car and stopped the driver on the interstate. They immediately recognized a bundle in the back seat of the car as a common way to transport drugs into the U.S.

Agents arrested a 27-year-old man who was driving and a 20-year-old female passenger, both U.S. citizens, and seized the vehicle and drugs.

While agents searched the car, the two men who were left behind were also arrested as they tried to flee into Mexico.

Officials said a 38-year-old man and 23-year-old man, both Mexican citizens, were taken into custody shortly before agents found another bundle of marijuana floating inside the canal near the two men.

The bundles of marijuana weighed 47.4 lbs. and have an estimated street value of more than $28,000, according to the release. The three men, the woman, the vehicle and the marijuana were turned over to the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area Task Force.

Last fiscal year El Centro Sector Border Patrol agents seized 5,713 pounds of marijuana.