From: Nogales International
By Curt Prendergast
On the evening of April 22, 2013, federal agents were following up on a tip that someone was going to buy a large amount of cigarettes at a duty-free store in Nogales and try to sell them in the United States.
As an agent watched, a white van pulled up in front of Border Shoppers on Grand Avenue, where it was loaded with cardboard boxes full of cigarettes. Then, instead of crossing the border, as is required for duty-free purchases, the van turned and headed away from the Dennis DeConcini Port of Entry.
Agents followed the van, eventually stopping it in the area of the swap meet near Baffert Drive. Inside they found 840 unstamped cartons containing 16,800 individual cigarettes that were allegedly headed to California. If the scam had succeeded, it would have meant more than $20,000 in lost tax revenue for the state of Arizona.
Instead, the cigarettes were seized and four of the men detained in the operation were charged in local courts. Two have been convicted: Oscar Flores, 24, of San Diego, and Daniel Espejel, 34, of Chula Vista, Calif.
Flores, who pleaded guilty to a Class 4 felony count of attempting to transport 10,000 or more unstamped or unlawfully stamped cigarettes for sale, was sentenced on Feb. 3 at Santa Cruz County Superior Court to four years probation. Espejel pleaded guilty to a Class 5 felony version of the same offense and was sentenced on Dec. 9 to unsupervised probation, which he was allowed to serve from Tijuana, Mexico.
