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Feds Bust $45M Cocaine Tunnel Running From Mexico Into a Fake San Diego Store
Federal agents discovered a sophisticated drug smuggling tunnel running from Tijuana to a fake San Diego storefront called Buy 4 Less, seizing over a ton of cocaine worth $45 million linked to the Jalisco New Generation Cartel. Four suspects are charged.
The US Attorney's Office for the Southern District of California released video of a 2,000ft (610m) long tunnel between border cities in Mexico and the United States.
The store was called Buy 4 Less. It sold nothing.
Underneath its storage room floor, hidden behind a hydraulic lift, was the entrance to a 2,000-foot tunnel running directly into Tijuana, Mexico.
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It had reinforced walls. A rail system. Ventilation. Electricity.
Someone built an entire infrastructure project under a fake discount store near one of the most watched border crossings in America.
The tunnel was discovered as part of a months-long Homeland Security investigation into the Buy 4 Less warehouse located near the Otay Mesa Port of Entry in San Diego, directly across the border from Tijuana.
Agents watched. They waited. Then they moved.
Investigators observed a truck being loaded with packages at the Buy 4 Less store and pulled it over shortly after it left the parking lot.
Then they pulled over two more.
More than 2,269 pounds of cocaine were found across three vehicles combined. Federal officials then searched the store and found the tunnel exit concealed under the storage room floor along with the hydraulic lift used to access it.
Over a ton of cocaine. Under a fake store. Through a tunnel nobody knew was there.
Four people were arrested and charged. Gregorio Hernandez, 29, and Jose Jimenez, 32, both of San Diego, along with Mexican nationals Antonio Cortez, 18, and Brandon Escalante, 26, all face conspiracy to distribute cocaine charges.
Hernandez faces additional charges of conspiracy to use a border tunnel and conspiracy to import controlled substances.
All three counts carry a maximum sentence of life imprisonment and a fine of up to $10 million.
If you have followed this far, here is the detail that puts this in a much larger context.
Homeland Security Investigations confirmed the operation was connected to the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, one of the most powerful and violent criminal organizations in Mexico.
This was not a small-time operation. JNGC does not build 2,000-foot tunnels with rail systems for small-time operations.
It was also the first operational tunnel found in the jurisdiction of the Southern District of California since 2022.
Four years of no tunnels did not mean no tunnels. It meant this one had not been found yet.
US Attorney Adam Gordon captured it simply. "For these defendants, it wasn't a light at the end of the tunnel. It was lights and sirens."
The border wall is above ground. The Jalisco New Generation Cartel was operating six stories below it.
The tunnel is sealed. The cocaine is seized. The four suspects are in custody.
Somewhere on the other side of that border, the cartel is already thinking about what comes next.
Editor's Note: The discovery of the Buy 4 Less tunnel is a reminder that the most sophisticated drug smuggling infrastructure in the world does not come through ports of entry or over walls. It goes underneath them, quietly, for years, until someone starts watching a discount store that never seems to sell anything.
