Border Patrol seizes 105 pounds of smuggled fentanyl pills in southern California

Sept. 22 (UPI) -- U.S. Border Patrol agents seized 105 pounds of smuggled fentanyl pills, less than two weeks after illicit drugs were also recovered in Southern California.

At approximately 4 a.m. Friday, agents assigned to the San Clemente Border Patrol Station stopped a suspicious silver sedan near Avenida Vista Hermosa on Interstate 5, the agency said in a news release . San Clemente is 53 miles north of San Diego.

A Border Patrol K9 team conducted a non-intrusive search of the vehicle and alerted agents to search further.

Agents discovered a large amount of plastic-wrapped packages placed inside trash bags in the car's truck.

They contained 40 cellophane-wrapped packages with blue fentanyl pills.

The male driver, identified only as a U.S. citizen, was taken into custody. The suspect and narcotics were later turned over to the Orange County Sheriff's Department.

"Transnational Criminal Organizations continue to threaten our communities by bringing dangerous narcotics such as fentanyl into our country," San Diego Sector Chief Patrol Agent Patricia McGurk-Daniel said. "We will continue disrupting these organizations through our vigilance and the commitments we have made to serve and protect our communities."

On Sept. 6, San Diego County agents seized around 168 pounds of fentanyl pills during a traffic stop on Interstate 8 near Pine Valley. The narcotics had an estimated street value of $1.3 million.

This seizure is the result of Operation Apollo, a multi-agency, counter-fentanyl effort that began on Oct. 26, 2023, in southern California and expanded to Arizona on April 10.

In 2023, nearly half of the approximately 2,800 pounds of fentanyl seized by the U.S. Border Patrol iwas encountered in the San Diego Sector. The encompasses approximately 60 linear miles of international border with Mexico.

San Diego Border Patrol agents have seized approximately 700 pounds of fentanyl in the current fiscal year.

Sixty-eight percent of the reported 107,081 drug overdose deaths in 2022 involved illicitly manufactured fentanyl, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention . "Even in small doses, it can be deadly," according to the CDC.

The CDC noted most recent cases of fentanyl-related overdose are linked to illegally made fentanyl.

It is 50 times stronger than heroin and 100 times stronger than morphine.