U.S. Attorney’s Office files over 150 border-related cases in California

SAN DIEGO (KYMA) - The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) says the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of California filed 151 border-related cases this week.

The DOJ says the cases include charges of bringing in undocumented migrants for financial gain, reentering the U.S. after being deported and importing drugs into the country.

In addition, the Southern District of California, according to the DOJ, is also prosecuting "a significant number of proactive cases related to terrorism, organized crime, drugs, white-collar fraud, violent crime, cybercrime, human trafficking and national security."

The DOJ also says the Southern District of California provided a sample of the following border-related arrests:

• Julio Villa-Urzua of Mexico was arrested and charged with importing drugs into the country after Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers found 929 pounds (28 buckets) of liquid methamphetamine "dissolved into the fluid of the passenger-side fuel tank of a semi-truck driven by Villa-Urzua while applying for entry to the U.S. at the Otay Import Cargo Facility Port of Entry" last Thursday.

• Edgar Clemente Gonzalez Huales of Guatemala was arrested and charged with bringing undocumented migrants into the country after Border Patrol agents stopped his vehicle in Boulevard, California over the Fourth of July weekend. Gonzalez Huales stopped his vehicle, told two undocumented migrants to run away, and speed off in his white BMW sedan, but he was later arrested Monday after agents used a spike strip to stop the vehicle.

• Geronimo Benitez Velazquez of Mexico was arrested and charged Tuesday after Border Patrol agents found him hiding under a tree 500 yards north of the U.S.-Mexico border, three miles east of the Tecate Port of Entry. He was previously deported, earlier this year, from San Diego.

The immigration cases, according to the DOJ, were referred to, or supported by, the following federal law enforcement partners:

• CBP
• U.S Border Patrol
• Homeland Security Investigations
• Immigration and Customs Enforcement's Enforcement and Removal Operations
• Drug Enforcement Administration
• Federal Bureau of Investigation
• U.S. Marshals Service
• Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives

The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of California encompasses both San Diego and Imperial Counties.

To learn more about the cases, read the press release below.