On February 28th 2001 in Nogalas, Arizona federal agents raided a border house and seized 840 pounds of cocaine that had been trafficked through an underground smuggling tunnel. "If we were to say that there are no more tunnels out there than we'd have our heads in the sand," said Special Agent Jim Molesa, spokesman for the United States Drug Enforcement Agency. (Ibarra) "When you here that someone constructed a tunnel, that takes money, that means planning, that means someone is organized", said Ruben Saavedra, commander of the Multi-Agency Drug Task Force.
             The tunnel found in Nogalas along with the 840 pounds of cocaine demonstrates how many dollars are at stake for the trafficker's of these drugs. (Ibarra) This article emphasizes the severity of the drug problem in our country and the world. Anthony P. Maingot, a sociologist who researched the worldwide drug economy estimated that proceeds of the world drug trade were $1 trillion in 1999. With such enormous amounts of profit at stake, effective enforcement is next to impossible. (D.E.A.NNICC)
             Drug tunnels aren't the method of choice for most smugglers, but they pose a very big threat because they can move hundreds of thousands of pounds of drugs virtually undetected. (Ibarra) Another drug tunnel discovered in Douglas, Arizona in 1990 is still the most sophisticated tunnel that has ever been found. It was a cement-lined tunnel thirty feet underground that linked a townhouse in Mexico to a warehouse nearly 300 feet apart in America. The shaft leading down to the tunnel was concealed by a pool table with a hydraulic lift on the Mexican side and a private locked room on the American side. The wooden walls of the tunnel were so old that agents believed the tunnel to be in use for more than thirty years. (Ibarra)
             Dennis Wagner and Scott Flannery of the Arizona Star said, "If America's and the world's drug war is not already ...