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WNB

Spokane couple owners of house on U.S. end of dope-smuggling tunnel
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation | 7/24/2005

SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) - The house at the U.S. end of a 110-metre drug-smuggling tunnel to British Columbia belongs to a Spokane-area couple, the Spokesman-Review newspaper reported Saturday.

Three Canadian men were arrested in connection with the case. The tunnel, reinforced with wooden supports and rebar, stretched from a metal hut in B.C. to a point underneath the living room of a house in Lynden, Wash.

The house is owned by Raman and Kusum Patel, the Whatcom County Assessor's website said. The Spokane County Assessor's website indicates the same couple purchased a home in the Mead area of Spokane County in July 2003.

Neighbours told the newspaper the Patels live at the Mead home. There was no immediate response to a message left on a telephone-answering machine at the only residential listing for Patel in the area.

A U.S. federal search warrant was served at the Mead house Thursday, spokesman Jeff Eig with the Seattle bureau of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration told the newspaper.

Investigators used a "sneak-peak" warrant available under the U.S.A. Patriot Act to enter the U.S. house July 2 and later installed cameras and listening devices in the home.

Through those devices, authorities said they observed the defendants make multiple trips through the tunnel carrying large hockey bags or garbage bags later determined to contain marijuana.

No arrests were made following the search and Eig would not say whether the Patels are considered part of the investigation.

Charged Thursday in U.S. District Court in Seattle with conspiracy to distribute marijuana and conspiracy to import marijuana were Francis Devandra Raj, 30; Timothy Woo, 34 and Jonathan Valenzuela, 27, all of Surrey, B.C.

More than 30 tunnels have been found at the southern border dividing the United States and Mexico but this is the first one discovered on the U.S.-Canadian border, officials said.

Construction of the tunnel began over the last year and was finished earlier this month, officials said.

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Lady_Mary

How sad, it is a great idea. Isn't it time to correct the "common knowledge" of this simple, harmless plant!

All the best,

killer12382

The feds have to protect us from the terrorist inspired cannabis aimed at the hearts and minds of our childrens souls.....bla bla bla.

Higher Logic

How many times have we heard from the "Right" that the Patriot Act was going to be used to "protect us from terrorists?" And how many times did we keep saying that it was a bunch of bullcrap and they were justing using the PA as a means of abusing their powers even further, especially in the case of marijuana. Pathetic.

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Niteshift

Before we sit and complain about mj enforcement and all the popular things............

Doesn't it seem to anyone that a tunnel leading from one country to another, bypassing immigration and customs, is something the feds should be interested in?

Yes, it turns out it was only pot being smuggled through. But how would they know that without checking? (The article says "later determined to contain marijuana", indicating that they weren't sure what was being smuggled)

Put it another way: If it turned out is was anthrax and not pot, how many of you would think it was outrageous then? Again, until they check, how do they know which one it is?

Isn't that very near where the guy with a pile of explosives was intercepted on his way to commit a terrorist act on New Years 2000? Answer: Yes.

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Higher Logic

I just don't see the point in digging a tunnel to smuggle anthrax into the country. It's not terribly hard to get it here through normal means; the article even talks about how they find tunnels like this all the time in Mexico, which are used for smuggling drugs and the occasional illegal, but certainly not anthrax. And by the way, what did happen to the anthrax mailer?

Niteshift

the article says they found about 30 this year.

Regardless, anthrax, RPG-7's, backpack nukes, pirated DVD's, fake Gucci purses, pot or whatever...........Anything being smuggled into the country comes under the scrutiny of Customs, which is now part of Homeland Security. The substance is immaterial.

Pretty much every country employs Customs practices. This is not just a US practice.

The item being smuggled is immaterial. In this case it happened to be pot. That's the main reason most of the people on here will complain about it. I'm simply saying look at the bigger picture. I damn well want my government to investigate a tunnel under our borders, regardless of what is being trafficked through it.

WNB

I agree. The only real question I have is whether the patriot act is a law enforcement tool or an anti-terrorism tool?

Niteshift

It is both in reality.

Anti-terrorism is a law enforcement problem. So a tool that fights terrorism can easily be a law enforcement tool.

Look at it this way...........what if they entered a place looking for bomb making materials (we'll say for the sake of argument that this is their true belief), but when they got there, they found the place was counterfeit money. Of course You wouldn't expect them to ignore it.

Tunnels under the border, are a bad thing. It's not about drugs, it's about bypassing our border protections. Sure, sometimes it stops drugs. Sometimes it stops guys with cars filled with explosives and some bad intent.

It's sort of like stopping cars for speeding. Sometimes it only nets speeding. Sometimes it nets drugs. Sometimes it nets Tim McVeigh leaving OKC (he was caught over speeding and a tag violation). If we started complaining about speed enforcement because sometimes it bags drug smugglers, we'd ignore the other good it does.

«°Ñøvã°»

Being a consumer of MJ and a tax payer i for one would be concerned over these tunnels for reasons outlined. Just seems to extreme to me but all the more reason legalization needs to happen.

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