Busted in Texas

Busted in Texas The US spends billions on its border war. Now its chaotic drug policy is also costing a fortune, as border checkpoints snare not immigrants, but young Americans caught with small quantities of Marijuana.
"I've got a piece of advice for you. If you don't wanna get busted leave your dope at home. We are gonna bust you", Arvin, the local sheriff at the Sierra Blanca immigration checkpoint, says firmly. The checkpoint is on I-10, a highway that runs from California to Florida - a road that never even goes into Mexico. Not surprisingly, it doesn't catch many immigrants. Eight out of ten people stopped at the checkpoint are Americans. In the local police station they have 60,000lbs of seized dope, but most of it in small amounts. Processing these small busts is overwhelming local resources: their case load has gone up from 300 to 3,000 cases a year. "That little baggy of marijuana, you know how much that cost the state of Texas?" Judge Mike Doyle laughs. Now the federal government is cutting the funding that they receive to process busts at the checkpoint. So do they keep fighting a war on drugs that their own government doesn't seem keen on supporting? "With all the budget cuts in Washington, it's about to get a lot worse", Arvin insists.
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