Back in the News: US-Canada ecstasy smuggling ring and Lynch's Border Songs

I don't like to post twice about the same book, but this article is just too dead-on to pass up.

Last month I posted about Jim Lynch's Border Songs, a novel all about a border patrol agent who busts drug smugglers along the Canada-Washington state border.

Flash forward to this morning, when the BBC ran the article "US border agents bust US-Canada 'ecstasy smuggling ring':"

Four people are in custody in the US and Canada after a suspected drug smuggler fired on US border agents and fled, sparking a day-long manhunt. 

The incident began on Tuesday morning when border agents encountered two men carrying backpacks five miles (8km) east of Sumas, Washington, in the US. Authorities say agents interrupted an attempt to smuggle a load of MDMA, or ecstasy, from Canada to San Francisco... 

On Tuesday morning, US border agents ordered the two men they encountered near the border to halt, officials said. One of the men dropped his backpack, fired a weapon at the agents, and ran, according to a criminal complaint filed in US federal court in Washington on Wednesday. 

The officers took the other man, identified as Jeffrey Laviolette, into custody immediately. Canadian and US police searched for the fugitive on foot and by helicopter, putting up road blocks. Nathan Hall, a Canadian citizen, was arrested by the Abbotsford Police Department in British Columbia early on Wednesday morning. According to border patrol agents, the backpacks Mr Hall and Mr Laviolette were carrying contained a total of 58lb (26kg) of ecstasy.... 

The wooded area a few miles east of a highway border crossing is a well-known smuggling route for drugs and firearms, and a spokeswoman for the US attorney for the Western District of Washington told the BBC smuggling prosecutions are "a large part of our practice".

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