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MORE PEOPLE, MORE TECHNOLOGY, MORE DANGER

Border Patrol Struggles To Stem Tide

DOUGLAS - Agents Tom Madrid and Dana Banks start tracking "fresh sign"
at about 9 a.m., following footprints into the Perilla Mountains just
above the U.S.-Mexican border east of town.

They aren't sure who they're after, but they know they aren't far
behind. Humping up the steep slopes northbound toward Arizona 80, they
find themselves on a trail 100 yards below the crest of the peaks.
Their quarry is moving fast, especially for such radical climbs, and
Madrid and Banks can't see anyone.

An hour turns into five as, eyes to the ground, they push north to
Saddle Gap, where the tracks scatter. Madrid and Banks figure they've
been seen, but they decide to check out the area before heading back.
Good thing.

By 3 p.m., they're flying off the mountain in a U.S. Customs Black
Hawk chopper with 350 pounds of marijuana in eight canvas-covered bales.

About 1,500 U.S. Border Patrol agents are posted along Arizona's
southern flank.

They hide in desert brush along the San Pedro River. They spring
commando-style ambushes along mule trails in the Pajarito Mountains
west of Nogales. They walk the Colorado River bottom near San Luis.
They sit on mountainsides all over Cochise County with night-vision
and infrared gear, straining to see the bodies moving like ants across
a border that might as well not exist.

Their mission hasn't changed in the 75 years of the Border Patrol's
existence. Though trucks replaced horses years ago, agents still
bounce through Arizona's backcountry and cruise the streets of its
border towns trying to keep illegal immigrants and contraband from
coming into the United States.

But there are new problems. Drug smuggling in the United States is
being squeezed into an ever-smaller corridor, now centered in Arizona.

Illegal immigrants are flooding into the state through the same
corridor, and the smugglers have learned to use the crowded conditions
to their advantage.

They bank on the agents' being too busy to notice them. They keep
track of how many agents are on each shift, what areas they work
regularly, when shift changes occur.

They watch the agents watching the border.

They have their own sophisticated night-vision gear and radio
equipment. They put spotters on surrounding mountains. They intercept
radio communications on unsecure channels. They send armed scouts
ahead of loads to case the routes. They relay instructions via
encrypted radio transmissions or cell phones.

"Their countersurveillance is very, very good," said Kevin Oaks, a
longtime Border Patrol agent in southern Arizona. "It's a cocktail for
disaster."

Agent Augie Clarkson hunkers down behind a creosote bush, the chicken
scratch of his boots breaking the silence. In the pitch-black night of
the southern San Pedro River Valley, he can hardly see the railroad
tracks in front of him.

But he knows there are people up there because a night-scope operator
several miles away is describing the infrared images to him over a
police radio.

The tracks are a popular route into the heart of the valley,
particularly for couriers backpacking drugs to a nearby roadway. From
there, the dope is whisked to safe houses in Tucson, Phoenix and
points beyond.

Clarkson kneels impatiently, straining to see and hear. At 23, he's
the youngest agent in Naco, with a face too fresh and friendly to be
in this business. But he knows the ropes - he's the son of a Yuma
Border Patrol agent.

As Clarkson fidgets, he hears the faint crunch of gravel. It gets
louder, clearer, until the feet are nearly upon him. Clarkson waits
for five shadowy figures to pass, then follows quietly behind.

He jumps with the sudden white beam of a flashlight. "Stay where you
are! Put your hands where I can see them!" he yells in Spanish.
Several dimly lit figures drop to the ground, while others scatter,
then stop in their tracks.

They have packs, but no dope - only extra clothes and water. They are
peasants from central Mexico, heading to Chandler for work. One gives
thanks that it's la migra. He thought they'd been waylaid by bandits.

Clarkson surprised 43 illegals that night. The station's 24-hour
count: 134. Nobody caught any dope, but it doesn't matter much to
Clarkson. It doesn't even matter that he'd arrested one group in
nearly the same spot the night before.

"I have a fun job," Clarkson says. "I get to hunt humans for a
living."

Border Patrol agents still track people the old way, "cutting sign"
left along a trail. But they also have an array of electronic gizmos,
from mobile infrared optical scopes to low-light cameras and ground
sensors that help them find their quarry.

Even so, the job today is more difficult - and dangerous - than ever
because there are so many crossings.

From 1993 to 1999, immigrant apprehensions increased fivefold in the
Tucson sector, which stretches from New Mexico nearly to Yuma.

And although catching drugs is secondary to catching people, the
Border Patrol's marijuana seizures in the sector more than doubled in
the past four years.

The situation is due in no small part to President Clinton's border
strategy. Since 1993, he has doubled the number of Border Patrol
agents to more than 8,000.

In 1994, there were 287 in the Tucson sector. Now there are nearly
1,300, including many more stationed there temporarily as part of
Operation Safeguard. There are more patrol agents along Arizona's
border than there are local police in all of Arizona's border towns
combined.

Much of the new muscle is stationed in Nogales. Border Patrol
officials hoped to cut smuggling by driving it from city streets into
the open desert east and west of town.

Night searchlights went up along the fence that marks the border.
Agents were posted a few hundred yards apart. Roving drug interdiction
teams took to the hills outside town.

The result: Illegals apprehended in Nogales jumped by 62 percent from
1997 to 1998. Marijuana seizures increased 12 percent. Cocaine
seizures jumped from 13 pounds to 1,718 pounds.

Predictably, smugglers of illegals and drug traffickers - "coyotes"
and "narcos" in smuggling parlance - have begun to move their business.

"These guys can change the direction of a shipment instantaneously,"
said Jim Molesa of the Drug Enforcement Administration. "The
government takes years."

A bright red Dodge Laser turns north from the border road in Naco and
cruises down the main drag. Suddenly, the driver spooks, makes a
U-turn and heads south.

A green and white Ford Expedition with "Border Patrol" splashed across
its ribs takes off in hot pursuit.

Just short of the border port station, the Laser peels east onto a
dirt track. With agents closing in from all sides, the Laser veers
south into the thigh-high border fence, an impromptu barrier made from
welded railroad steel. It crashes to a halt in a choking cloud of dust.

Seconds later, agents draw beads on what looked like a suspect slumped
over the dash. It isn't. They find only an air bag. The driver is
gone, having scrambled to freedom over a rise in Mexico.

Still there is backslapping all around for what's left behind: 10
bundles of smelly weed weighing in at 142 pounds.

A few minutes later, a pickup truck suspected of being in cahoots with
the smuggler cruises the Mexican side of the line with police cars
following.

"They're probably protecting it," Agent Ray Cosme grouses.

There's no rule book on smuggling, but drug fighters swear it was once
an unspoken code: Neither side would try to hurt the other. Running
was fine, but no guns. They abided by a maxim, "Live to play the game
another day."

Then in June 1998, Border Patrol Agent Alexander Kirpnick was killed
during what should have been a routine marijuana stop on the outskirts
of Nogales. A smuggler shot Kirpnick in the head, making him the
sector's first agent since 1926 to be fatally shot in the line of duty.

Although murder remains rare, violence has escalated since the
mid-'90s. Agents dodge rocks, bricks and invectives. Random gunfire is
constant. Many Border Patrol agents are equipped with helmets and body
armor. And where a drug load was once abandoned at the first sign of
the law, smugglers may now defend the stuff with firepower.

Agent Butch Gamboa, 36, was sniped at while driving a lonely road near
the San Pedro River, a favorite haunt for runners. He was also pinned
down once at the Western Corrals, a grassy outback near the border
south of Palominas.

Drug task force agents had set a trap for a load of marijuana. The
snare was sprung in the dead of night when four vehicles came through.
As agents closed in through the tall grass, smugglers laid down a hail
of gunfire. Gamboa and other agents were kept at bay until a
helicopter arrived with searchlights. The smugglers retreated to
Mexico, leaving some of the dope behind.

Halfway between Douglas and Naco, Agent Joe Garcia, 27, tunes his
scanner to a frequency used by the dopers. Two voices speak Spanish,
one giving instructions to the other. It's clear the two have just
crossed the border, but Garcia can't figure out where. He does know
this much: The smugglers want la migra to see a big group of illegal
immigrants crossing.

It's a common tactic. The agents go after the immigrants while drug
smugglers sneak in behind. If agents are lucky, they'll catch both. A
week earlier, Garcia was called to a shed in Naco where illegals were
thought to be holed up. Inside were 14 people and 400 pounds of marijuana.

The voices on the scanner are breathless now, and Garcia guesses
they're backpacking dope in high country, so he focuses his binoculars
on nearby mountains. He sees nothing.

As night falls, Border Patrol spotters farther west see two cars and a
truck stop along Arizona 92 to load something. Garcia takes after
them, burying his speedometer to catch a black Beretta.

He pulls the car to the shoulder. A half-dozen illegals and a driver
are squeezed inside.

Because there are no other agents to help, Garcia takes the Beretta's
keys, tells the illegals to stay put, then takes off after the second
car. Several miles later, he arrests eight more illegals.

But the first group is gone. They had a spare key.

Garcia is philosophical about it. There are too many people and drugs
coming across to catch them all. He does what he can.

"All we're doing, really," he says, "is just slowing them down."

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