Teenagers confessed to using drones to smuggle drugs into the US from Mexico

Drone for illustration

Jonathan Elias, 18, and Brayan Valle, 19, has admitted in federal court to using drones to smuggle nearly 30 pounds of heroin from Mexico to the United States.
It was the first drug seizure involving a drone along California’s border with Mexico, said Lauren Mack, spokeswoman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in San Diego. She was unaware of any other drone-related seizure on the 1,954-mile divide between the two countries, the Associated Press reports.
The teenagers said they drove to a field in Calexico, California where they picked up the 28.6 pounds of heroin that was sent across the border. Elias took over control of the drone from an operator in Mexico after the aircraft crossed the border, Mack said.
“With border security tight, drug traffickers have thought of every conceivable method to move their drugs over, under and through the border,” said Laura Duffy, U.S. attorney for the Southern District of California. “We have found their tunnels, their Cessnas, their jet skis, their pangas, and now we have found their drones.”
The defendants, both from El Centro, each face maximum sentences of 20 years in prison when they are sentenced Oct. 20 for possession of heroinwith intent to distribute.