Baja California state security forces arrested two men in Tecate on March 18 after catching them exchanging approximately 5 kilograms of crystal methamphetamine in the San Pablo neighborhood. Officers identified the suspects as Ramón Uriel, 34, and Jorge Antonio, 49, both originally from Sinaloa.
Suspects Tried to Discard the Drugs
Police on patrol spotted the two men outside a building during what appeared to be a drug handoff. When officers approached with emergency lights activated, both men attempted to discard the packages of meth. They were apprehended before they could flee the scene.
Authorities recovered roughly 5 kilograms of crystal methamphetamine, a quantity consistent with wholesale distribution rather than personal use. The case has been transferred to federal prosecutors in Tijuana, with logistical support from the Mexican military and the National Guard.
Tecate as a Drug Corridor
Tecate sits about 35 miles east of Tijuana along Mexico Highway 2, just south of the small Tecate port of entry into California. The border crossing processes far fewer vehicles and pedestrians than Tijuana’s San Ysidro or Otay Mesa crossings, but it remains a persistent corridor for narcotics smuggling.
On the U.S. side, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has reported multiple large meth seizures at the Tecate port in recent years. In one case, CBP officers extracted 122 pounds of methamphetamine from metal casings hidden inside an SUV’s tires. In another, officers found over 1,000 pounds of meth concealed in a tractor-trailer roof, valued at nearly $4 million.
The arrest on the Mexican side of the border is part of a broader pattern of joint state and federal operations targeting drug trafficking in Baja California’s smaller border communities. Tecate’s population of roughly 110,000 makes it far smaller than Tijuana, but its proximity to the border crossing and to Highway 2, which connects to Mexicali, gives it strategic value for trafficking organizations.
Both suspects face federal drug trafficking charges. Their transfer to Tijuana for prosecution places the case under FGR (Mexico’s federal attorney general) jurisdiction, which handles narcotics cases involving quantities above personal-use thresholds, as reported by Punto Norte.