The Border Patrol

Our RV park offers tours to places all over Texas and other states. We've already been to most of the areas that intrigued us so I seldom check the tours listed. When I arrived early for an exercise class one morning I wandered over to the bulletin board and found a tour of the Border Patrol Station in Brownsville.

The Border Patrol is a constant presence here. Their vehicles, white with a green diagonal stripe, greatly outnumber police cars.

I was immediately interested in finding out more about them. One early Wednesday morning John, I and   

Barb Stackman went to Brownsville for the tour. 

 It was an educational experience. We had several agents give an interesting talk about their jobs and responsibilities.

 The most unusual contraband ever found? Two hundred pounds of queso blanco - fresh Mexican cheese purchased for about $1.50 a pound in Mexico and sold for $20.00 a pound in Houston.

What nationalities other than Mexican try to sneak in? Practically all of 'em! Germans, Czechs, many Europeans posing as returning Americans or Canadians try to cross in at one of the busy checkpoints in the valley.

 What happens to confiscated vehicles? They're sold, or if an SUV or truck, converted to Border Patrol use. In one case an SUV taken in on one end of the valley was relocated to another end. The SUV had been used to smuggle cash in to Mexico, and $80,000 had been found in it. When it arrived at it's new home the mechanics found another $8,000 that missed the first inspection.

A motor home was seized and sold to a retired couple here. When they tried to go back home to the north, cocaine was found by a drug dog. The drug had been overlooked by earlier inspectors.

We got to visit the holding area, with two "visitors" in residence.

We also saw the TV surveillance room. Let me tell you, there are thousands of cameras in use. They could zoom in on a car and read the license plate. There were at least ten agents watching banks of monitors. I'm estimating Brownsville alone had 250 cameras, and we suspect they didn't show us everything.

The U S Border Patrol is the largest police force in the world, with 60,000 members.