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Border patrol agent admits to 'accepting $400-a-head bribes to smuggle migrants'
A U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent has pleading guilty to conspiracy to transport an undocumented migrant and admitted to accepting bribes.Â
Rodney Tolson Jr. admitted to accepting $400 per person while working with smugglers for two months in 2019.Â
It's unclear how much money Tolson received in total but it has been reported that Tolson helped in as many as six operations between February and March.Â
When Ronaldo Vidaurri Jr. was pulled over and caught smuggling five migrants in March 2019 he confessed to law enforcement that he was being aided by a border patrol agent.Â
According to a plea agreement filed this week, Vidarurri claimed that Tolson helped him cross the border with 'loads' of undocumented migrants.
The plea deal states that 'Tolson would call…and tell [the co-conspirator] which lane and time window to use for crossing through the checkpoint' while regularly assigned to Interstate Highway 35. Â
The co-conspirator turned on WhatsApp messages between him and Tolson. When the informant asked Tolson if he was “ready to make some cash,” the agent replied, 'U know it,'
In 2019, along with being turned in by the smugglers he was assisting Tolson was caught on surveillance video waving an unidentified smuggler through a border checkpoint.
Once Tolson began to suspect that Department of Homeland Security investigators were on to him he suggested the smugglers cross at distant ranches straddling the border, since he had keys to the gates and knew where the cameras were located.
Tolson had worked with the agency since 2008. He was arrested on May 21 and indicted by a grand jury before signing his plea deal on July 7.Â
He was charged with one count of conspiracy to transport and move a migrant who was in the U.S. illegally and two counts of transporting a migrant for monetary gain.Â
Tolson now faces up to 10 years in prison but it is unclear when he will be sentenced.Â
In 2019, it was reported that criminal misconduct by US border officers was at a 5-year high according to internal US government reports. The arrest rate within the CBP that year was about five times higher than that of any other law enforcement agency.Â
The CBP has been struggling with internal criminal misconduct for years now.Â
A 2015 audit by the CBP integrity advisory panel discovered that “arrests for corruption of CBP personnel far exceed, on a per capita basis, such arrests at other federal law enforcement agencies.”
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9788129/Border-patrol-agent-admits-accepting-400-head-bribes-smuggle-migrants.html