U.S. Attorney’s Office Filed 84 Border-Related Cases This Week

SAN DIEGO – Federal prosecutors in the Southern District of California filed 84 border-related cases this week, including charges of bringing in aliens for financial gain, reentering the U.S. after deportation, and importation of controlled substances.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of California is the fourth-busiest federal district, largely due to a high volume of border-related crimes. This district, encompassing San Diego and Imperial counties, shares a 140-mile border with Mexico. It includes the San Ysidro Port of Entry, the world’s busiest land border crossing, connecting San Diego (America’s eighth largest city) and Tijuana (Mexico’s second largest city).

In addition to reactive border-related crimes, the Southern District of California also prosecutes a significant number of proactive cases related to terrorism, organized crime, drugs, white-collar fraud, violent crime, cybercrime, human trafficking and national security. Recent developments in those and other significant areas of prosecution can be found here.

A sample of border-related arrests this week:

• On February 13, Mexican nationals Carlos Cortes De La Cruz and Carlos Cortes Garcia – a father and son who were the alleged captains of a smuggling vessel carrying a dozen undocumented passengers - were arrested and charged with Attempted Bringing in Aliens for Financial Gain. According to a complaint, the U.S. Coast Guard intercepted the vessel which was dead in the water and riding low under the weight of the passengers, off the coast of Point Loma. Officials deemed the vessel unsafe and transported the passengers to Ballast Point, where the defendants were arrested by Border Patrol. Also arrested were Mexican nationals Jorge Andrade-Guzman, Aristeo Cortez-Abarca, Jose Antonio Lorenzo De La Cruz, Allan Alfonso Mancilla Garcia, Lorenzo Meza Hernandez, Sergio Luis Rico-Ornelas, Ciriaco Rojas-Duarte, Luis Vargas-Vill and Javier Zavala-Paredes. They were passengers charged with Attempted Entry After Deportation.
• On February 15, Aracely Guadalupe Herrera Gutierrez, a Mexican citizen, was arrested and charged with Importation of a Controlled Substance. According to a complaint, Customs and Border Protection officers discovered 153 packages containing 154 pounds of methamphetamine and seven pounds of fentanyl concealed in the rear bumper of the defendant’s vehicle as she tried to cross into the U.S. at the San Ysidro Port of Entry.
• On February 18, John Nixon, a U.S. citizen, was arrested and charged with Bringing in Aliens for Financial Gain. According to a complaint, Nixon and a passenger applied for admission to the U.S. in the vehicle lanes of the Otay Mesa Port of Entry. Customs and Border Protection officers found the passenger’s identification to be fraudulent. The passenger, Mexican citizen Jose Rosales-Murillo, was arrested for Attempted Entry After Deportation. Rosales-Murillo had been previously removed from the U.S. in 2008. According to the complaint, Nixon claimed he accepted the smuggling job in order to pay off his girlfriend’s $5,000 drug debt.

The immigration cases were referred or supported by federal law enforcement partners, including Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Enforcement and Removal Operations (ICE ERO), Customs and Border Protection, U.S. Border Patrol, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the U.S. Marshals Service (USMS), and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), with the support and assistance of state and local law enforcement partners.

Indictments and criminal complaints are merely allegations and all defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.