SAN DIEGO — U.S. Border Patrol agents assigned to the Campo Station discovered 112 pounds of fentanyl hidden inside a vehicle at their Pine Valley checkpoint last week.
Agents are said to have pulled over a 2003 SUV that was traveling westbound on Interstate 8.
According to Border Patrol, during the brief stop and investigation, an agency K-9 team forewarned about the vehicle.
Agents reportedly transported the vehicle and driver, a man and United States citizen, to the Interstate 8 Border Patrol checkpoint in Pine Valley.
Once there, agents searched the vehicle and discovered “nine plastic-wrapped packages concealed in its roof.”
They contained blue pills that tested positive for fentanyl, according to a news release issued by the Border Patrol.
The packages weighed approximately 112 pounds with an estimated street value of $1,536,000.
The driver and vehicle were turned over to the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department for prosecution.
The Drug Enforcement Administration took control of the drugs.
“Transnational criminal organizations do everything they can to distribute these harmful narcotics and earn their profits with no regard for the destructive effects they have on our communities,” said San Diego Sector Chief Patrol Agent Aaron M. Heitke. “Our Border Patrol agents remain vigilant, day and night, to intercept these poisons and the smugglers who transport them.”
Border Patrol says between October 2022 and April 2023, its San Diego Sector has seized more than 920 pounds of cocaine, 1,263 pounds of methamphetamine, 67 pounds of heroin and 866 pounds of fentanyl. And that just in the first four months of this year, it has seized a quarter of a billion dollars worth of narcotics at ports of entry in the San Diego area.