ICE, ATF partner to fight gun smuggling

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) - Two federal agencies on Tuesday joined forces to reduce gun-related violence at the U.S.-Mexico border and throughout the country.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives teamed up with U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement to streamline the agencies' work to stop gun trafficking and to better prosecute those who commit gun crimes.

Officials with both agencies signed the partnership agreement Tuesday at the Sheraton Uptown in northeast Albuquerque.

In the past, the two agencies have often overlapped on their investigations, but now they hope to change that.

ICE officials on Tuesday spoke about the need to control gun trafficking at the border because it doesn’t just affect border states, like New Mexico.

Illegal guns that have been smuggled have been found all over the country.

The new efforts include adding several hundred agents to the border.

Another step is inspections of cars going into Mexico from the U.S., not just those coming out of Mexico.

Also, a database the U.S. already uses, which can trace guns found in Mexico back to the U.S., will soon have a Spanish version to help Mexican law enforcement.

“We can use these as investigative to leads to find out where the guns are coming from and who is transporting the guns down south,” Kenneth Melson, acting director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms said.

The agencies plan to implement the Spanish-language version of the tracing system in December.

The agencies said they hope to have a fingerprint database in place by 2013 that will identify all criminal illegal immigrants who are jailed across the country.