OFFICERS PREPARE FOR NEW TRAFFIC VIA MEXICO

Illegal Cargo

Semi trucks from Mexico could roll through Kentucky soon, and some police
worry they will come with cocaine, marijuana and other drugs hidden in fake
exhaust stacks, tucked behind false panels or stuffed into secret cavities
in chassis.

Officers from a Kentucky agency that polices the highways expect such
sophisticated means of concealment to become more common after the North
American Free Trade Agreement opens most U.S. highways to trucks from
Mexico, perhaps as early as May.

Drug runners caught by officers of the Kentucky Division of Vehicle
Enforcement have been hiding their drugs in obvious places, where trained
police dogs can usually sniff them out. Last month, a KVE officer near
Elizabethtown didn't even need a dog: The 222 pounds of marijuana hidden
under a bunk behind the truck driver's seat smelled so strongly that the
man confessed as soon as the officer stuck his head in the cab.

KVE officers have seized a mountain of drugs from truckers over the past
decade, but a commander over interdiction predicts less success after
NAFTA. Maj. David Herald said he expects cartels to infiltrate Mexican
trucking companies and rig vehicles to hide drugs.

The drug industry will become entwined with legitimate trade, he said.
"People don't realize it, but this is a huge, huge business, and NAFTA is
going to assist in the transport of these drugs unknowingly.''

Police think that more addiction and crime could result from NAFTA. But
some observers say that's a far-fetched scenario.

"The idea that you're going to have all kinds of narcotics running over the
border from Mexico is crazy,'' said Jim Giermanski, the director of
international business studies at Belmont Abbey College near Charlotte, N.C.

A trade specialist who spent a decade studying the cross-border trucking
business in Texas, Giermanski said Mexican trucks will have to run a
gantlet of three inspection agencies: U.S. Customs, which looks for
contraband; the U.S. Department of Transportation, which will inspect for
safety; and state police, which check both.

Customs agents already use a battery of high-tech detection equipment,
including $3.5 million X-ray machines, $900,000 gamma ray scanners, and
electronic measuring devices that can compare the lengths of interior and
exterior trailer walls to find hidden cavities. Meanwhile, federal
transportation agents are assembling electronic registries with information
about the drivers and the companies that own the trucks.

"We're going to know what kind of underwear these guys are wearing because
we're going to check them out,'' Giermanski said.

Bill Munk, a Texas policeman who has spent 34 years working that state's
highways, sees things differently. The traffic captain with the Texas
Department of Public Safety thinks more drugs will cross the border under
NAFTA. And, like Herald, he thinks they'll be coming in trucks with hidden
compartments.

Although some will be caught by U.S. Customs agents, Munk said, others will
slip through. "For a time, their facilities and our facilities may be so
flooded that we don't have time to look at all the loads that are coming
across,'' he said. "Customs facilities in most locations are swamped as it
is.''

Roger Maier, a Customs spokesman based in El Paso, Texas, said any truck
that passes through a customs inspection with drugs will probably get
caught, no matter how good the concealment. On Nov. 23, inspectors caught a
truck with 6,919 pounds of marijuana mixed in with a load of lawn
sprinklers, he said. Earlier that month, on Nov. 7, they used a gamma ray
scanner to catch a truck with what inspectors call "deep concealment.'' It
had 1,196 pounds of marijuana in a cavity between the exterior wall of the
trailer and a false panel inside.

But Maier acknowledged that few trucks actually are inspected so
thoroughly. At the El Paso crossing, the third-busiest entry point on the
U.S.-Mexico border, inspectors can scan 24 to 28 trucks an hour, but 2,000
to 2,400 come from Mexico each day. "Obviously, we can't catch everything;
we try very hard,'' Maier said.

$110 million to get ready NAFTA was supposed to open most U.S. highways to
trucks from Mexico two years ago, but safety concerns have kept them to
within about 20 miles north of U.S. border cities. That restriction was
deemed a violation of the trade agreement, and an act passed by Congress
last year and signed by President Bush last month requires full compliance.

The border will open to cross-country shipments after the Federal Motor
Carrier Safety Administration builds more inspection stations and develops
regulations to maintain American safety standards. The act provides about
$110 million to do that, said Dave Longo, an agency spokesman in
Washington. He said the border is expected to open fully in May or June.

It's unclear how many trucks will come. Longo said his agency expects 5,000
Mexican companies to apply for authority to operate beyond the border zones
in the first year. Nearly all those companies are expected to limit their
operations to California and Texas in the beginning, for want of business
in other states, he said.

That business will probably grow with time. In 1994, the first year of
NAFTA, 2.7 million trucks crossed the border from Mexico, according to the
U.S. Customs Service. By 2000 the number had nearly doubled, to 5 million
trucks. In that same period, trade between the United States and Mexico
grew from $100 billion to $248 billion, according to a recent report by the
U.S. General Accounting Office.

John Jones, an associate professor of economics at Georgetown College, has
studied NAFTA and trucking. He said that when U.S. highways were opened to
trucks from Mexico for two years beginning in 1980, the cross-border
shipment of goods grew 43 percent in the first year. He expects similar
growth this time. "I think you'll be surprised that it's going to be quite
rapid,'' he said.

Studying subterfuges Kentucky police lack the equipment and the legal
authority to fully inspect every truck the way U.S. Customs agents can, but
officers with Kentucky Vehicle Enforcement are doing what they can to
prepare for NAFTA. They have been studying manuals that describe types of
"deep concealment'' encountered elsewhere.

Their most useful tools are six drug-sniffing dogs. The animals are put to
work during safety inspections if officers notice fudged itineraries or
catch signs of nervousness in a driver -- a flicking finger, darting eyes
or labored breathing.

But extra training is needed to deal with deep concealment, Herald said. He
estimated it would cost $250,000 to teach officers and dogs how to find
well-hidden drugs. They also may need more sophisticated and costly
equipment. Given the tight state budget, Herald hopes help will come from
federal grants. Dealing with NAFTA, he said, "is going to take funding and
it's going to take a huge effort.''

Jones, the associate professor at Georgetown College, counseled caution
against spending more money to catch drug runners. Government officials
should determine what society will get in exchange. He said, "They could be
pulling money away from noble causes, like cleaning up the environment or
research on child illnesses.''