RISING VOLUME OF DRUG TRADE MAKING MARK ON ARIZONA

(Phoenix)-- Arizona is the nation's hottest drug corridor these
days.

Pot, methamphetamine and heroin roll across the southern border so
fast and in such large quantities that almost no part of the state is
unaffected.

The drug problem has gotten so bad that federal agents refer to
Arizona as "America's doormat for marijuana" and Tucson as its "stash
house."

"At any given time in Tucson, there are more than 2,000 locations
where you can buy drugs or find stash houses," police Capt. Kermit
Miller said.

And in Phoenix, the Office of National Drug Control Policy reported
that more than two-thirds of the city's homicides and more than half
of the assaults were drug-related.

U.S. Customs Service agents confiscated almost 84 tons of pot in
Arizona in fiscal 1999, four times what was seized at the start of the
decade.

According to the Office of Drug Control Policy, 11 major
drug-trafficking organizations are based in Arizona, working directly
with Mexican cartels.

It doesn't stop with drugs either, The Arizona Republic reported
Monday. The syndicates also smuggle immigrants, extort money, steal
cars and launder money.

Until the mid-1980s, most of South America's cocaine was smuggled into
the United States via Florida. But when Dade County drug rings started
having gun battles in broad daylight, federal authorities cracked down.

The drug rings began looking for new routes and found allies in
Mexico's pot and heroin smugglers. The skyrocketing drug trade moved
faster than law enforcement could move in.

Along America's southern border, there are 39 crossings, 24 ports of
entry and 2,000 miles of desert.

For the last six years, President Clinton has beefed up staffing on
the border to about 8,000 agents, more than twice the number in 1993.

Added enforcement in California and Texas has pushed growing numbers
of smugglers into Arizona.

The smugglers will eventually shift into rural stretches of western
Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. Agents say that will make them easier
to spot but won't stop the trade.

The growth in the number of smugglers and undocumented immigrants has
angered and frightened many residents in southeastern Arizona.

"These people cut fences, [urinate] in their water tanks, leave trash
everywhere and don't ever close a gate," said Bill Wendt, a Douglas
businessman. "I tell you what, if you live in this part of the country
and you go out in the country, you'd better have a gun."

Reform Party candidate Pat Buchanan is scheduled to tour the Douglas
frontier Tuesday.

But not everyone is worried about the influx.

Raul Enriquez, owner of the T-Bone restaurant in Douglas, said the war
on drugs keeps border towns thriving.

"Legalize?" he said. "We'd have a . . . depression. Do you know how
many people would lose their jobs?"