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Are American Smugglers Using Canadians As Drug Mules

May 3rd, 2008 by GiGi

This has to be one of my favorite rumors that spread like wildfire among the cross border shoppers between the United States and Canada.

American smugglers are hiding drugs in Canadian vehicles and then following them across the border

This rumor/warning has been around since December 2006. The concept seems plausible (smugglers turning innocent cross-border shoppers into unknowing drug mules), those in the know on both sides of the Canadian/U.S. border say there’s nothing to the tale.Jean D’Amelio Swyer, manager of communications with Canada Border Services Agency, reported that she has never heard of such a case.

Kevin Corsaro, public affairs officer with Customs and Border Protection in Buffalo said: “To the best of my knowledge we have never encountered anything that would resemble that.” Corsaro also noted that he previously worked in narcotics, so if the scheme was tried in the past 12 years he would have heard about it.

Although secreting illegal substances in vehicles that will soon be making border crossings might sound like the way to go for a smuggler intent upon moving his goods into another country at little risk to himself of arrest, so much can go wrong with such a plan that the odds of losing the shipment should keep all but the foolhardy from trying it.

Not every vehicle bearing Canadian license plates parked at a U.S. shopping mall will head for the border at the end of the day
Someone attempting to move contraband would not necessarily know ahead of time which cars would be ferrying exhausted shoppers back to the Frozen North with their mall-crawling bargains and which cars would be heading for Florida with their cargoes of vacationers.
Even if a northbound vehicle could be selected with assurance and drugs loaded into it without anyone’s catching sight of what was going on and summoning the police to investigate, nothing guarantees that the smuggler wouldn’t lose sight of the loaded automobile during its trip to the checkpoint or after it had cleared Canadian Customs (or that the car would eventually stop at a time and place suitable for removal of the contraband).
Given that one visually misplaced vehicle potentially means waving bye-bye to a shipment worth many thousands of dollars, the typical arrest-averse smuggler is more likely to instead opt to pay someone to carry his goods across the border.

Another email warning that just bit the dust.

Many thanks to Snopes.com for this article