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Customs agent let drugs slip through
JAMES PINKERTON | Housten Cronicaler | March 25, 2006

PROGRESO - With surveillance cameras secretly rolling, U.S. Customs Inspector Lizandro Martinez greeted the driver of a truck that pulled into his inspection lane at 5:30 a.m.

The driver, a pal from the inspector's days as a police officer more than a decade earlier, told Martinez that the cargo he'd been expecting was right behind his truck. And sure enough, a white Ford pickup appeared. It carried 1,635 pounds of marijuana, packed and ready for the streets of America.

But Martinez didn't stop it, didn't inspect it, didn't call out the dogs. He just waved it through on that lonely morning, FBI agents say. And for that, agents say, drug traffickers paid him $10,000.

Three years later, Martinez, 44, is behind bars, suspected of taking more than $1 million in bribes while waving through more than 50 tons of drugs — more than his law-abiding colleagues seized at eight South Texas ports of entry in an entire year.

As Martinez awaits sentencing, set for April 26, authorities are trying to figure out what happened, how an agent on the front lines of the so-called "drug war" went so terribly bad. And what's emerging, some former law enforcement officials say, is a troubling picture, a striking example of how Customs failed to prevent flagrant corruption on the Texas-Mexico border.

Neither Martinez, in custody since his arrest on Nov. 7, 2004, nor his lawyer, Charles Banker, could be reached for comment.

In October, court records show, Martinez pleaded guilty to charges of money laundering and conspiracy to import more than 1,000 kilos of marijuana. He faces as much as life in prison and a $4 million fine.

What's most disturbing about his case, some law enforcement officials say, is that U.S. Customs and Border Protection kept Martinez on its payroll even as complaints against him mounted during his 13-year tenure.

Customs internal affairs officers investigated Martinez 15 times, resulting in letters of caution, oral and written reprimands, mandatory counseling, three short suspensions and two attempts to fire him permanently, according to testimony at a Feb. 22, 2005, court hearing.

Customs officials declined to talk about why Martinez wasn't taken off the streets sooner. "We don't comment on specific cases," said Lynn Holinger, a CBP spokeswoman in Washington.

Martinez kept his job on one occasion, thanks to the Washington, D.C.-based National Treasury Employees Union.

Union officials said they only tried to ensure that Martinez was treated fairly.

"The role of NTEU or any union is to ensure that employees accused of misconduct are fairly represented in proceedings with the agency," union president Colleen M. Kelley said in a statement.

Cash purchases

According to court records, the FBI and Immigration and Customs Enforcement learned that Martinez was allegedly taking drug bribes in August 2003. The agencies — along with the IRS and the Texas Department of Public Safety — began investigating him as part of what they called Operation Dark Shadows.

Investigators found that Martinez and his wife, Sandra, who was not charged in the case, appeared to be living far beyond their means. He earned $55,664 a year and she did not report an income. Yet in 2003, agents said, the couple made more than $400,000 in cash purchases. They bought such items as diamond rings and a diamond-studded Rolex watch. They purchased a $240,000 used car dealership in downtown McAllen and 10 classic, big-engine "muscle cars" worth $76,800, according to government documents.

They also made cash payments toward a $529,963 home in McAllen. The luxurious house featured a swimming pool, elaborate stained-glass windows, balconies, a basement movie theater and two free-standing garages. Each room was equipped with a television.

All despite the fact that Martinez and his wife had gone through bankruptcy proceedings in 2000 and had claimed assets of only $7,850, court records show.

Martinez began working at Customs in September 1991. He had been a police officer in the South Texas town of Hidalgo in 1984 and 1985. While there, he met Roberto Dominguez, an officer since 1979. But Dominguez was fired in 1996 after an alleged off-duty shoplifting incident in McAllen, said his lawyer, Al Alvarez.

Sometime later, federal agents say, Dominguez began working with traffickers. They allege he escorted trucks carrying drug loads and tipped off Martinez when they were about to cross the border.

In November 2004, Dominguez was indicted along with Martinez and six others. Now in custody, Dominguez has pleaded guilty to drug charges and awaits sentencing.

During their investigation, agents filmed Martinez as he waved drug-laden trucks through his lane at Progreso. The trucks' cargo beds were covered with tarps and "filled to the top with marijuana ... sometimes you could see it protruding," FBI agent Marella Ruelas testified.

To avoid letting the smugglers know that Martinez was being watched, agents allowed the drug loads to pass through Progreso. But they arranged for state troopers or police to stop the vehicles later and seize the drugs as part of what would appear to be unrelated traffic stops, Ruelas said.

The federal indictment formally charged Martinez with allowing eight loads of marijuana totalling 9,530 pounds to cross at Progreso. Court records show he was accused but not charged in connection with another four loads weighing 3,945 pounds, meaning he was linked to a total of 13,475 pounds of illicit cargo.

But investigators in the case suspect that Martinez actually waved through much more contraband — more than 100,000 pounds of drugs, according to an estimate by an investigator familiar with the case.

That would be more narcotics than was confiscated at eight ports of entry stretching from Brownsville to Del Rio in fiscal 2005, ending Sept. 30. During that period, inspectors seized 79,633 pounds — or 39.8 tons — of marijuana and 10,600 pounds — or 5.3 tons — of cocaine from cars and trucks, federal statistics show.

Investigators say their estimates of what Martinez allowed to cross are based on interviews with drivers accused of bringing loads across the bridge. They calculate he let through at least 100 loads.

Smugglers were so confident, sometimes they crossed the bridge in the inspector's lane twice a day, agents say.

The smuggling operation fell apart after one participant and an informant began talking to authorities, Alvarez said.

"All these cases end up the same way," said Alvarez. "There is no honor among thieves, as they say."

Disciplinary problems
What surprised some law enforcement officers was that Martinez wasn't caught sooner.

His history of disciplinary problems came to light at the Feb. 22, 2005, McAllen court hearing in which his lawyer was appealing a district court decision to hold him and Dominguez without bail.

According to testimony at the hearing:

Customs suspended Martinez for 30 days in August 1993 for allegedly threatening to cut off the penis of a man he suspected of having an affair with his wife. That punishment was reduced to 14 days after union arbitration.

In May 1997, according to testimony, Customs fired Martinez after internal affairs officers investigated allegations that he had been spotted at a party attended by Mexican drug traffickers, made threatening calls to the home where his ex-wife lived and used a government vehicle to run personal errands.

But the union got Martinez reinstated, with back pay, in April 1998.

"We defended Mr. Martinez on a charge of misuse of a government vehicle, not a drug-related charge," Kelley said in her statement. "Whatever he may have been suspected of then or now had no bearing on that case, and he was reinstated by a neutral third party.

"In our society, everyone is entitled to a defense and that is what we provided Mr. Martinez in the case involving the government vehicle. Any attack on our role in that matter is fundamentally an attack on the right of every American to have adequate representation when accused of an offense."

Given last chance

Customs later tried firing Martinez again, accusing the inspector of being absent without leave, improperly copying Customs entry documents and allegedly forcing a teenage girl to partially disrobe even though female inspectors were available, a violation of search guidelines.

But after union arbitration, his proposed dismissal was reduced to a 30-day suspension in March 2001 and he was transferred to Progreso under a "last chance" agreement.

Customs officials say that only a tiny minority of border agents is ever accused of drug corruption.

"But is one too many? Darn tooting, and it's a sad thing," said David Higgerson, acting director of field operations at the CBP's regional office in Laredo.

''We are always concerned with these cases," Higgerson said. "We have an ongoing program with our managers to spot these things before it gets too bad. We have ways of ferreting out people who go over to the dark side. And it's sad. These are people who have taken an oath."

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dedbr

Did a US government employee just make a reference to the 'darkside?' Are we in church or a Star wars movie?


Ernest Borgnine as 'Dutch' in the movie "The Wild Bunch"


For further comments, see my signature, please......


"A prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our government was founded...Prohibition goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control a man's appetite by legislation, and makes a crime out of things that are not a crime."
Abraham Lincoln

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WNB

How did he go wrong? Probably because he realized the drug war is ineffective and immoral, and decided to make the best of the situation and make some extra money allowing through drugs that are going to get through anyway.

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Buzzby

I'd say you're attributing some sort of high moral purpose when the explanation is most likely simple greed. Most people in this culture are simply greedy and materialistic and this couple fits right in, as demonstrated by what they did with the money.

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Cassius

Now now, Buzzby, how are you supposed to be at one with the universe with an attitude like that?

Wait, did you mean marijuana culture or criminal culture?

If you meant criminal culture, nevermind. But if you meant marijuana culture, you're probably right, and the same could probably be said of people who have a hobby of drinking or smoking tobacco or any other vice. It appeals to the people who want to escape reality, the people who don't want to accept responsibility for their own lives. But you know as well as I do that we are not ALL like that (yes I know you said most, not all) -- and as for the others well the only way to show them enlightenment probably doesn't include calling them greedy and materialistic, even though it might be true =P

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Dennis

Let me first say that as the Texas Department of Public Safety were busting the loads of weed on the side of the road that got past Martinez, tractor trailers loaded with pot were passing them every few minutes. Good luck with that enforcement thing anti-marijuana activists cops.

Everyone is greedy to a certain extent. It's human nature. Ambition is okay, ruthless ambition like marijuana prohibition is not.

Buzzby

Seeing things as they are is very much a part of being at one with the universe.


American culture, including both American marijuana users and American criminals.


You can't show people enlightenment. They have to achieve it through their own efforts. Holding up a mirror for them is often part of the process.