Two U.S. border protection officers in Southern California have been charged with taking thousands of dollars in bribes to allow people to enter the country through the country’s busiest land port of entry without showing proper documents, prosecutors said.
The officers, Farlis Almonte and Ricardo Rodriguez, were charged on March 24 with conspiracy to bring in aliens for financial gain, bringing in aliens for financial gain and receipt of bribes by a public official, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of California.
An investigation began after several smugglers who were arrested in September told investigators they had been working with U.S. border inspectors, according to a criminal complaint that was unsealed on March 25.
As U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers, Mr. Almonte and Mr. Rodriguez were assigned to immigration inspection booths at the San Ysidro Port of Entry in Southern California, the complaint said.
They were charged after investigators found text messages that showed they had informed human smugglers in Mexico when they were scheduled to work and what lanes they were assigned to in exchange for thousands of dollars, the complaint said.
The scheme lasted from August 2024 through January 2025, prosecutors said. Investigators said that both men deposited “abnormal amounts of cash in the latter half of 2024” into their accounts.
Mr. Almonte appeared to have deposited almost $22,000 in cash, broken into small deposits, while Mr. Rodriguez deposited about $24,000, also in small deposits, investigators said.
After Mr. Almonte was in custody, investigators seized nearly $70,000 in cash that they believe his romantic partner was trying to move to Tijuana, The San Diego Union-Tribune reported.
In one case during an evening in December, a driver with four passengers entered a lane that Mr. Almonte was monitoring when he was presented identification and “noticed that the documents did not appear to have been issued to the passengers” but still waved them through, the complaint said.
“Those four were later determined to be aliens without documents allowing them to enter or remain in the United States,” according to the complaint.
In another episode, surveillance video recorded a vehicle with a driver and a passenger at a checkpoint but only the driver had proper documentation, the complaint said.
The officers “failed to perform their official duties, often admitting without any meaningful inspection cars with multiple passengers, while documenting that only the drivers were present,” the complaint said.
Lawyers for Mr. Almonte and Mr. Rodriguez did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Monday.
“Any Customs and Border Protection agent who aids or turns a blind eye to smugglers bringing undocumented immigrants into the U.S. is betraying their oath and endangering our national security,” the acting U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of California, Andrew Haden, said in a statement. “Those who engage in such misconduct will be held accountable to the fullest extent of the law.”
Susan C. Beachy contributed research.
