SMUGGLER'S ALLEY IS NO EASY STREET

Cross-border Co-operation Since 9/11 Means Less Contraband Is Making
It Across The St. Lawrence River

OFF CORNWALL ISLAND, ONT. -- As dusk approaches, a Mountie and an Ontario
Provincial Police officer on an OPP cabin cruiser spot the smugglers'
little flat-bottomed speed boat coming their way from an inlet on the U.S.
side of the St. Lawrence River.

The officers, whose forces have combined resources for this fight, rev the
engines of their craft and the chase is on.

For decades, this maze of islands, channels and stretches of open water has
been one of the most notorious smugglers' alleys in North America.

Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks a year ago, authorities on both sides
of the border, members of a relatively new Integrated Border Enforcement
Team have redoubled efforts to make sure nothing and nobody crosses
illegally from either direction, especially not people with bombs. For the
right price, the police say, smugglers will as readily take contraband
cigarettes north as terrorists south.

This evening the cargo is in large, unmarked cardboard boxes. It could be
anything. The two smugglers in their little boat see the approaching OPP
cruiser. This pair know these waters well. They turn their small boat
south, back to what they believe is the safe haven of U.S. waters where
Canadian police have no legal jurisdiction.

Dodging the heat by Ping-Ponging across the water boundary is an old ploy.
Not that long ago, a nifty cross-border deke would have worked. Not today.

The crew on the OPP boat have already alerted the other half-dozen U.S. and
Canadian law enforcement agencies on a new IBET digital radio network.

Within seconds, a U.S. Border Patrol boat responds, roaring out from the
mouth of the St. Regis River to force the smugglers' boat around and toward
the Canadian side of the St. Lawrence.

The smugglers point their bow west and race along the long wooded shoreline
of Cornwall Island. A small open-cockpit RCMP launch joins the chase.

Minutes later, a larger, black RCMP Zodiac with a Mountie and a Cornwall
city police officer aboard speeds to the far end of the island on a
parallel course, ready to intercept the smugglers when they try to make the
turn north.

The digital radio network is alive with encrypted messages going back and
forth between officers from the Canadian and U.S. forces. The crews of each
boat know where the others are, where they are headed and what they can do
to block the smugglers. The new radio system is working like a charm.

In desperation, the smugglers jettison their cargo. The heavy cardboard
boxes hit the water with an explosive splash and split open, sending small
plastic bags flying. The cargo today is contraband cigarettes.

The little smugglers' boat picks up speed -- hitting about 70 kilometres an
hour -- and cuts through a shallow channel.

Behind the wheel of the black Zodiac, RCMP Sergeant Gilles Tougas turns
sharply. He knows these waters, too, and he knows his boat can make it
through that same channel.

The officers on the OPP boat hear the echo of two gunshots along the
shoreline. Seconds later Sgt. Tougas and his partner, Cornwall Senior
Constable Don De Gray, also hear shots.

Sgt. Tougas thinks these sound like shotgun blasts, not the directed fire
of a high-powered assault rifle that he has heard along the river in the
past. These blasts were probably fired by other smugglers lurking in the
bush just to intimidate the police.

The black RCMP boat hits choppy water at full speed on one of the twists
and turns. The jolt sends Sgt. Tougas smashing into the side of the cabin.
An X-ray later confirms he has chipped the tip of his right shoulder bone.

The police Zodiac is fast, but not fast enough to keep up with the
smugglers now that they have dumped their goods. As the gap widens, Sgt.
Tougas calls off the pursuit.

The smugglers are lucky today. Sort off. They haven't been caught. But
they've had to dump black-market cigarettes worth $30,000 into the St.
Lawrence to make their getaway.

For the authorities it has been another opportunity to practise
co-ordinated tactics and test their skills and equipment. Not that the cops
aren't happy to have stopped a large cigarette shipment. But the bigger
picture is always stopping terrorists.

For generations guns, drugs, money, contraband booze and cigarettes have
been moving back and forth across the river and through the Mohawk Indian
lands that straddle the border. People smuggling is a recent addition to
the mix.

Smuggling used to be easier. The distances are short. A three-minute trip
on open water at night could get you into the United States from the
Akwesasne Reserve without much trouble.

If you spotted a U.S. cop you just turned around and went home. The
smugglers took advantage of the tangle of law enforcement jurisdictions
here -- two countries, New York state, the provinces of Quebec and Ontario,
not to mention municipal and Indian reserve police forces -- to avoid arrest.

But with the IBET the cops say they are getting the smugglers more often
than not.

The Central St. Lawrence Valley IBET is one of the first. It began
operations only 20 months ago.

But in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, Washington and
Ottawa have agreed to create a dozen more IBETS along what Canadian and
U.S. politicians have liked to call "the world's longest undefended border."

The police themselves bristle at the phrase. If you think undefended means
unpoliced, they've got a few surprises for you here on the St. Lawrence.

The Mounties and the U.S. Border Patrol monitor a string of high-tech
acoustic and seismic sensors for suspicious off-road traffic and marine
movements. The two sides designed the system together to avoid duplication
and to make sure there are no obvious gaps in coverage.

Information is being shared more readily and more quickly. U.S. officers
can now get criminal record information radioed to them almost immediately
when they are running a border identity check on someone with a record in
Canada, and vice versa.

The biggest advance has been in intelligence sharing. "Before the IBET we
weren't sharing the way we should have. It wasn't as easy to put the pieces
of the puzzle together," RCMP Inspector Mike McDonnel said.

"Our group has committed to no secrets as far as intelligence is concerned.
We are working on getting it out quicker," Insp. McDonnel added.

The next logical step is to put officers from one country on board boats
from the other. Mixed federal-provincial-municipal crews are already
routine on the Canadian side. But firearms laws in Canada and the U.S. are
a barrier to police moving back and forth quickly with their guns.

Ottawa and Washington are trying to iron out the weapons problem. "When the
governments come through and give us that cross jurisdiction, just watch
how the gloves come off," Insp. McDonell said.

The goal is to be able to make the border watertight during a security
crisis. The agencies want to be able to respond to intelligence and go out
with a 100-per-cent guarantee of interdiction of illegal cross-border
traffic, Insp. McDonell said. "We cannot accept failure for this mission."

Senior officers from municipal, provincial, state and federal law
enforcement agencies meet weekly, usually at the Cornwall RCMP detachment
in an industrial park near the international bridge, to plan joint
operations and co-ordinate patrol schedules.

The U.S. Border Patrol has stepped up its marine patrols. "Before, if you
were in hot pursuit, once they crossed the line that was it," says Dick
Ashlaw, the patrol agent in charge at the Massena, N.Y., post. "Now we've
got partners out there. We know where they are and we just get on the radio
and say, 'Hey, Mike, we've got one coming your way.'"

The agencies share equipment. The IBET's hand-held state-of-the-art
encrypted radios, which allow officers up and down the river to communicate
without smugglers listening in, belong to the RCMP. The agencies plan
equipment purchases with the needs of the entire team in mind.

The RCMP's next boat purchase, for example, will be a high-speed
interceptor rather than a large command-and-control cruiser.