EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – A U.S. resident who says she traveled to Mexico to see a doctor for weight-loss treatment has been arrested on federal drug charges at a Laredo, Texas, port of entry.
Erica Judith Posadas showed up at the Lincoln-Juarez International Bridge on Sunday requesting re-entry while driving a white Ford Explorer with Mexican license plates.
Posadas told a Customs and Border Protection officer she had traveled to Celaya, Mexico, to the weight-loss clinic and was driving back with her cousin, a Mexican national named Salvador Zamora Posadas.
The woman said her cousin had done most of the driving because she felt uncomfortable driving in Mexico but took over the wheel once they got to Nuevo Laredo, just across the border from Laredo.
The CBP officer listened to the explanation. He sent the Explorer and its two passengers to a secondary inspection area because an X-ray scan had alerted him to anomalies in the gas tank, documents filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas show.
CBP began installing Low Energy Portal (LEP) scanning systems at the port of entry last summer, agency records show. Vehicles approaching the inspection area pass through portals that emit X-rays and alert border officers to any structural anomaly.
Border officers introduced a fiber optic scope inside the SUV’s gas tank and found 25 bundles of narcotics inside. Records show the concealed drugs were cocaine and weighed approximately 65 pounds.
In an interview with Homeland Security Investigation agents, Posadas and Zamora denied knowing they were carrying drugs. Zamora said he purchased the Explorer just last week and that it was dropped off at his house in Celaya, Mexico, on Saturday.
Zamora said he decided to accompany his cousin to the United States because he has family in Houston that he wanted to visit. He allegedly told investigators he let his cousin drive through the port of entry because he doesn’t have a U.S. driver’s license.
Zamora and Posadas have been charged with unlawful importation of a controlled substance. Records show both waved preliminary hearings scheduled for this week in U.S. district court in Laredo.
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