San Diego
U.S. Border Patrol agents seized 760 pounds of marijuana from a pickup whose driver crossed the border but escaped back into Mexico on Thursday afternoon.
Agents said they saw a 1986 blue Ford Ranger pickup with a camper shell drive through a hole in the border fence about a mile west of the San Ysidro Port of Entry.
Border Patrol spokesman Michael Gregg said the agents tried to head off the pickup, but it made a U-turn back to Mexico. When the truck got stuck in the sand about 100 feet north of the border fence, the driver jumped out and escaped into Mexico, he said.
Gregg said Thursday’s seizure has a street value of about $1.2 million.
He said members of Operation Alliance--a task force of agents from the federal Drug Enforcement Administration, the U.S. Border Patrol and U.S Customs--have seized more than 3 tons of marijuana, worth an estimated $9.7 million, since Oct. 1, the beginning of the federal fiscal year.
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