Drone Flies 13 Pounds Of Meth Over Mexican Border Into U.S.: 1st Confirmed Drone-Delivery Of Meth In San Diego


A border wall touted by President Donald Trump might not stop the flow of drugs from Mexico to the U.S. after all. That’s because the above photo shows the bounty of meth that was captured by the U.S. Border Patrol, displaying the 12 packs of methamphetamine that had been seized from a U.S. citizen. The bevy of drugs was captured on Tuesday, August 8, when a border patrol agent saw a remote-controlled drone flying over the border fence at approximately 11:30 p.m. in the evening. The drugs were confiscated at a border crossing close to San Diego, with the man who flew the drone across the Mexican border into California now under arrest, according to the Los Angeles Times.

The noise from the drone’s motor is what clued the border agent into the presence of the drone overhead. The drone was headed towards San Ysidro, a district in San Diego just north of the U.S. border. But the Border Patrol agent gazed at the drone’s flight pattern and alerted other agents to watch for the drone coming their way. About ten minutes later, the first case of drugs being delivered by a drone in San Diego County was confirmed.

drone
[Image by Dean Mouhtaropoulos/Getty Images]

Border Patrol agents were next able to arrest the man with a bag full of methamphetamine weighing more than 13 pounds, with a street value of about $46,000. The drone itself had been stored beneath a bush close to Servando Avenue and Valentino Street. The Border Patrol supervising agent Mark Endicott noted that drugs being delivered by drones is a new method of delivery that they are seeing at the U.S. border, because the agents have had success with catching drug smugglers on the ground. Therefore, smugglers are looking for new ways to deliver drugs, and drones represent one of those pathways.

It wasn’t the first time that 25-year-old Jose Edwin Rivera used a drone to get drugs into the U.S. from Mexico. Rivera told authorities he’d used a drone to smuggle drugs five or six times since March, with Jose saying he would give the drugs to a man at a San Ysidro gas station, and get $1,000 once he delivered the drugs to the man.

Drone
[Image by David Rogers/Getty Images]

[Featured Image by U.S. Border Patrol/AP Images]

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