MARIJUANA SUPPLIERS JOIN IN ON HOLIDAY RUSH

Officials Have Seized More Than 93 Tons of the Drug Since Oct. 1

FALFURRIAS, Texas - As a steady stream of traffic pulled through the
U.S. Border Patrol checkpoint here, Agent Johnny did not look twice at
the gravel trucks, the 18-wheelers or even the powder-blue Cadillac.

But he knew instantly the green Dodge pickup was carrying more than
firewood. Johnny, a dope-sniffing Belgian Malinois, started barking
like mad, pawing and pressing his snout against the driver's door.

When agents got into the truck and pulled out the seat, there it was:
a half-pound or so of marijuana, bundled in plastic, in a cab doused
with air freshener to hide the smell.

It is dope time again in the southland. Every year from October to
January, marijuana smuggling into the United States skyrockets as
farmers from Mexico to Colombia rush to get their harvest to market.

"A lot of these guys are trying to buy Christmas presents, so they
want to sell what they have, then get home to spend time with their
families," said Will Glaspy, a spokesman for the U.S. Drug Enforcement
Administration.

Since Oct. 1, Border Patrol and U.S. Customs Service agents working in
the southernmost tip of Texas, from Laredo to Brownsville on the Gulf
of Mexico, have seized more than 93 tons of marijuana with an
estimated value exceeding $150 million.

That haul, which officials said marks a slight increase over last
year, represents an average of more than a ton a day. It is flooding
in stashed behind truck seats, mixed in with loads of tomatoes,
stuffed into hollowed-out floor beams of flatbed trucks and, in one
case, stuffed underneath a disabled grandmother sitting in the front
seat of a car.

Some drugs, including cocaine, heroin and methamphetamine, are not as
bulky and are easier to conceal.

Agents at this checkpoint, 60 miles north of the border crossing at
McAllen, Texas, found 12,000 ecstasy tablets hidden in the clothing of
a bus passenger on Sunday.

Smuggling of these drugs usually grabs headlines. But here, along one
of the busiest drug corridors in North America, officials say
smugglers are bringing in staggering amounts of marijuana from Mexico,
taking chances with bigger, heftier loads because economics are on
their side.

U.S. teenagers use marijuana more than any other drug, according to
the U.S. government's Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services
Administration. The agency's 2001 Household Survey of drug use found
that nearly 20 percent of youths surveyed between 12 and 17 reported
using marijuana at least once. That compared with about 3 percent who
reported using ecstasy and slightly more than 2 percent who reported
using cocaine.