Sniffing Out Billions in US Currency Smuggled Across the Border to Mexico American Chemical Society
go to original August 13, 2014

A U.S. Border Patrol agent looks for hidden bulk cash using a density detector called a "Buster" on the fender of a car. (Borderland Beat)

Criminals are smuggling an estimated $30 billion in U.S. currency into Mexico each year from the United States, but help could be on the way for border guards. The answer to the problem: a portable device that identifies specific vapors given off by U.S. paper money.

They will present the new research at the 248th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS), the world’s largest scientific society. The meeting features nearly 12,000 reports on new advances in science and other topics. It is being held here through Thursday.

In the past fiscal year, law enforcement officials say they uncovered more than $106 million in smuggled cash headed from the U.S. to Mexico. But this was only a small portion of the billions that made it across the border undetected — hidden among belongings, in clothing or elsewhere. The bulk of that currency is laundered drug money. Travelers crossing the U.S./Mexico border are required to report cash or endorsed checks over $10,000. If they don’t declare larger sums, the money that is found can be seized.

“We’re developing a device that mimics the function of trained dogs ‘sniffing’ out concealed money, but without the drawbacks, such as expensive training, sophisticated operators, down time and communication limitations,” says Suiqiong Li, Ph.D., a member of the research team. “The system would extract gas samples from the traveler or from bags, vehicles and shipping containers. It would detect the trace currency emission signature even in the presence of car exhaust, perfumes, food and a range of temperatures, atmospheric pressures and relative humidity.”

Li says the technique, known as the Bulk Currency Detection System (BCDS), should work effectively within the seconds or few minutes it takes for border inspections. It involves gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (GC/MS), a widely used analytical technique. Experts already use this method for analyzing vapors to detect drugs and explosives, as well as to investigate the causes of fires and identify unknown compounds. But the current way to uncover smuggled money depends on checks by guards or trained dogs, without the benefit of any devices, according to Li.

Read the rest at American Chemical Society

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