INS Decides to Keep Using 2 Checkpoints : Immigration: Influx of Border Patrol agents allows agency to keep San Clemente and Temecula freeway sites open.

The Immigration and Naturalization Service has decided to keep the controversial San Clemente and Temecula checkpoints in operation, an INS official said Thursday.

The INS has experimented with closing the checkpoints for several weeks and transferring agents assigned there to the border to stem illegal immigration.

But now that Congress, responding to political pressure, is adding hundreds of agents to the Border Patrol, it is no longer a “zero sum” game in which the INS has to choose between staffing the border or the checkpoints, the official said. The San Diego sector has nearly double the number of Border Patrol agents as a decade ago.

Some public officials in southern Orange County and northern San Diego County have long advocated that the INS abandon the San Clemente checkpoint along Interstate 5, the busiest Border Patrol checkpoint not along an international border.

In San Clemente and Dana Point, officials have worried about Border Patrol agents conducting high-speed pursuits of suspected smugglers trying to circumvent the checkpoint.

In northern San Diego County, officials blame the checkpoint for blocking illegal immigrants from reaching Los Angeles and thus forcing them to live in the canyons and open spaces in Oceanside, Carlsbad, Encinitas and elsewhere.

INS Commissioner Doris Meissner is set to announce today that the checkpoints will remain in effect, that more Border Patrol agents and INS inspectors are being deployed along the eastern reaches of the Mexican border, and that additional equipment, such as night goggles and sensors, will be used. The measures are part of what officials are calling Phase 2 of Operation Gatekeeper.

Until now, Operation Gatekeeper has concentrated on the Imperial Beach section of the border, using additional agents to catch smugglers and illegal immigrants. The section was the busiest along the border, with hundreds of migrants scurrying across the border each night, many with little fear of apprehension.

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“What we did was take on the toughest part of the border and break it,” the official said.

But smugglers and migrants are now attempting to cross in greater numbers near the San Ysidro and Otay Mesa ports of entry and farther east in the mountainous backcountry near Campo and Dulzura.

To thwart that movement, “we’re following the smugglers and aliens eastward,” the official said.

Pinching off the Imperial Beach crossing area has increased the smugglers’ use of two tactics: “running” the border checkpoint in their cars and packing illegal immigrants in vans and rented trucks.

Smugglers also are increasingly using “drop houses” in San Diego, homes where dozens of illegal immigrants are hidden before continuing to Los Angeles. The Border Patrol has instituted Operation Disruption to find those houses, the official said.

The San Clemente and Temecula checkpoints are important as a backup to apprehend people who have crossed the border, the official said.

“When the checkpoints are up, the drop houses fill up,” allowing the Border Patrol to make raids, the official said. “The smugglers are playing games and we’re responding.”

In answer to the concern in San Clemente, Dana Point and other communities, the INS has dropped its policy of high-speed pursuits of suspected smugglers.

At San Clemente, the INS hopes to photograph smuggling suspects so they can be prosecuted even if they succeed in having the immigrants flee before the agents close in, the official said. Also, the INS may use four lanes instead of two to speed the process of scrutinizing motorists.

The San Clemente checkpoint station has 92 agents; the Temecula station along Interstate 15 has 75.