BORDER ALERT HELPS SNARL DRUG TRAFFIC

BLAINE - The post-Sept. 11 vigilance along the Canadian border has yet to
yield any terrorists trying to sneak into the United States. But federal
officials say increased security and staff helped lead to two big drug
busts this month.

Border Patrol officials in Western Washington, whose ranks have been
boosted by the temporary assignment of 20 new agents, on Wednesday snagged
a cocaine-filled backpack left in a ditch east of Blaine. The 76 pounds of
cocaine presumably were left for a courier to pick up and whisk north to
Canada. With an estimated street value of $800,000, the cocaine seizure was
the agency's largest for the Washington border zone.

U.S. Customs officials have positioned more agents at remote border
crossings and increased overtime pay to extend the hours worked by agents
at the Blaine crossing. On Jan. 15, the Blaine agents found a record 1,400
pounds of marijuana in sacks mixed in with a semitrailer full of beer.

The driver was headed for California, where the "B.C. Bud" would have had a
street value topping $7 million.

"We're better at what we do because of 9/11. We're more diligent, and we're
looking harder," said Rodney Tureaud Jr., Seattle-based U.S. Customs
enforcement chief.

Even with the increased state of alert, federal officials say they get only
a small percentage of the drugs that move across the Canadian border.
Cocaine generally moves north into Canada. But most of the trade is
marijuana that moves south to U.S. markets.

In the past two decades, British Columbia marijuana has evolved into a $1
billion-a-year industry, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

Some of the B.C. marijuana is grown outdoors in clear-cuts and other remote
locations. But most is grown indoors under carefully controlled conditions.
It has gained a reputation for potency and quality that fetches premium
prices in U.S. markets.

Increasingly, drug smugglers are buying properties along the border and in
other strategic areas that can be used as staging grounds for smuggling
into the United States, Tureaud said.

The B.C. marijuana moves south in many ways. Motorboats, fishing boats and
sailboats haul it through Canada's Gulf Islands and into Puget Sound. Small
planes make short-hop flights. Backpackers hike through the North Cascades.

And drivers - ranging from teenagers to grandmothers - smuggle it along the
roads in cars, motor homes, pickups and big semitrailers such as the beer
truck driven by 28-year-old Dhillon Jafwinder of Brampton, Ontario.

Jafwinder, who was arraigned last week in Whatcom County Superior Court,
said he picked up the load in Vancouver, B.C., and did not know marijuana
had been stowed in bags stashed among the beer pallets.

Jafwinder is charged with possession of a controlled substance with intent
to deliver, a felony. If found guilty, he likely would serve no more than
three months in jail, according to Rosemary Kaholokula, a deputy
prosecuting attorney in Whatcom County.

He could be back to driving a truck before the year's end.

The Jafwinder bust is part of a post-Sept. 11 upswing in the amount of
marijuana seized at the border. It's unclear how much of that increase is
due to better surveillance, such as a new X-ray system to help screen
trucks, and how much is due to a trend toward bigger marijuana shipments.

Since Oct. 1, U.S. Customs agents have seized 6,036 pounds of marijuana in
the Blaine district, more than triple the amount during the same period in
2000. But the actual number of seizures is down. Since Oct. 1, U.S. Customs
has made 76 seizures, down from 99 in the same period in 2000.

The efforts to increase border security have been closely monitored by the
B.C. marijuana industry. And within the industry, there is at least a
perception of increased risk in the months since the terrorist attacks,
says Dana Larsen, editor of Vancouver-based Cannabis Culture.

Instead of sending marijuana south to the United States, some smugglers are
choosing what they view as safer options. Larsen said they are sending
their marijuana on less-profitable, but safer, routes to traffic in the
cities of eastern Canada. Or they're selling more in British Columbia.

This is expected to create a glut at least in B.C. markets and depress
prices, said Larsen, whose magazine offers an eclectic mix of articles
ranging from pot art to "Marijuana and the New World Order."

In the years ahead, border security is expected to continue to increase.

The U.S. Defense Department is getting involved, providing training and 200
personnel to aid in intelligence and air patrols along the northern border.

And there is strong support in Congress and the White House for increasing
spending along the U.S. border with Canada.

President Bush traveled to Portland, Maine, on Friday to propose adding
$2.1 billion for border security. That would include $1.2 billion for more
Border Patrol agents and $619 million to hire 800 more U.S. Customs Service
officials and buy new inspection equipment.

Border Patrol agents have been saying for years that they need more help in
trying to watch the 4,000-mile border with Canada.

One of the busiest smuggling areas has been the Blaine sector, which
stretches from Port Angeles to the western Cascades.

In 1999, Eugene Davis, then the deputy chief patrol agent in the Blaine
sector, told a House subcommittee that a lack of manpower prevented Customs
agents from responding to about half of the alarms set off by electronic
sensors installed to detect intruders.

On Jan. 14, the Blaine sector did receive some more support. The agent
count reached 77, as 20 agents were given a 60-day temporary reassignment
to help patrol the sector.

The extra staffing gives agents more time to do routine patrols rather than
scrambling off to respond to special calls, said John Bates, the current
deputy chief patrol agent.

Last week, on one of these routine patrols, agents spotted the cocaine
backpack lying in a ditch a few miles east of Blaine. It was filled with
four soap boxes that dogs sniffed out as cocaine. Agents staked out the
backpack, in hopes of finding the courier who would take it to Canada. But
they were unsuccessful.

Larsen, the Cannabis Culture editor, said international smugglers are
likely to respond to increased security along the B.C. border by shifting
more effort to remote areas in other provinces.

In a recent column in his magazine, Larsen also advised smugglers to take
to the sea, turn marijuana into smaller quantities of more potent, more
easily transportable hashish and to "nurture a love for the great outdoors"
with more cross-the-border backpack trips.