2026年8月14日 / 美国东部时间下午1:00 / 哥伦比亚广播公司新闻
撰稿：
在美墨边境一带，这个犯罪组织被称为“泳池”。本周，联邦当局称他们抓获了其中一名被控协助运营该团伙的男子。
每年都有被称为“跨境转运司机”的人员将在美国购买的二手车经墨西哥转运至中美洲转售。联邦检察官表示，一群南德克萨斯州商人找到了垄断跨边境汽车转运行业的方法——操控收费标准、集中营收，并胁迫拒不服从的商家就范。
当局称，该阴谋的核心人物是卡洛斯·马丁内斯，这位来自得克萨斯州米申市的商人绰号“库亚特”，掌控着得克萨斯州里奥格兰德谷地区洛斯印第奥斯边境口岸附近的跨境转运代理公司。检察官指控，马丁内斯——臭名昭著的海湾 cartel 前头目女婿——将一群看似相互竞争的企业整合成一个管控严格的网络，统一定价、共享营收、收取现金并实施恐吓。他已对联邦指控认罪并被判处监禁。
检察官称，与马丁内斯协同作案的还有里戈韦托·布朗，这位美墨双国籍公民曾以马丁内斯代表的身份担任管理职务，协助他实施被控的犯罪计划。布朗于2022年11月被起诉，罪名包括共谋操纵价格、瓜分市场，以及共谋垄断跨境转运代理业务。随后他便销声匿迹。
当局表示，近四年来布朗一直以逃犯身份藏匿在墨西哥。本周，他们在得克萨斯州麦卡伦附近将其抓获。他将于周五在休斯顿联邦法院接受传讯。
被控操纵价格的“企业”团伙
多年来，跨境转运司机承接的大部分业务都集中在一处。
根据联邦起诉书，2021年3月之前，墨西哥法规要求货物经得克萨斯州南部的洛斯印第奥斯口岸入境墨西哥。这使得该口岸周边形成了一个集中的行业集群，转运代理公司帮助司机处理车辆入境墨西哥所需的海关文件和其他手续。
检察官表示，该系统每年转运数千辆汽车，为转运代理公司带来数百万美元的营收。联邦当局指控一群经营者设法控制了整个行业。
检察官称，早在2011年，转运代理公司就达成协议统一收费，不再争抢客户，选择抬高价格并在彼此之间瓜分市场。
涉案企业据称将营收集中收缴，并按照约定比例分配资金。检察官表示，该组织运作十分有序，参与者使用图表和电子表格记录合作安排，并通过会议、电话、短信以及社交媒体和即时通讯应用程序就价格和营收情况进行沟通。
根据起诉书，部分参与者将这个集体企业称为“empresa”——西班牙语中意为“公司”。但检察官表示，控制价格只是该行动的一部分。
2006年12月19日，载有二手车和其他货物的车辆在得克萨斯州洛斯印第奥斯排队等待入境墨西哥。许多跨境转运司机来自远至华盛顿州、纽约州和加利福尼亚州。美联社/《山谷晨星报》，加夫列尔·埃尔南德斯 摄
“地板费”
根据联邦检察官的说法，涉案共谋者还控制了与获得许可的墨西哥海关经纪人间的合作关系，而这些经纪人是办理跨境转运手续的必要服务提供者。据称这种特殊安排使他们得以对团伙之外的商家施加压力。
起诉书称，没有特殊经纪人合作关系的代理机构被迫通过属于共谋团伙成员的代理机构开展业务，而一些外部商家也被强行纳入“泳池”团伙，被迫遵守其定价和营收分配规则。
本案中使用的“piso”一词在西班牙语中意为“地板”，被用来指代对通过洛斯印第奥斯大桥的车辆征收的所谓勒索款项。
检察官指控，一家转运代理公司老板因在“泳池”团伙之外运营且未缴纳所谓“税费”，被迫支付超过8万美元的费用。
政府表示，那些拒不服从的商家面临的不仅是经济压力。
起诉书称，该团伙使用威胁和恐吓手段来执行规则——包括针对行业参与者、其家人、员工、同伙和企业的暴力行为。
检察官补充称，其目的在于制造恐惧：劝阻市场内的企业叛逃，并阻止外来者挑战该团伙的垄断地位。
逃犯落网
布朗于2022年11月被起诉，罪名包括共谋操纵价格和瓜分市场（违反《谢尔曼反托拉斯法》第1条），以及共谋垄断市场（违反《谢尔曼反托拉斯法》第2条）。《谢尔曼反托拉斯法》于1890年通过，旨在为联邦当局打击大型企业垄断提供法律工具，如今该法律主要用于此类案件。
三年多前被起诉后，布朗一直藏匿在墨西哥，直到本周在麦卡伦附近被捕。在他落网之时，该案的大部分审理程序已在联邦法院推进，布朗的八名同案被告已被判刑。
例如，马丁内斯受到了最严厉的处罚：因承认共谋操纵价格、瓜分市场，共谋垄断，通过勒索干扰商业活动以及共谋洗钱，被判处11年联邦监禁并处200万美元刑事罚款。
其他被告因承认这项大规模调查所涉罪名，被判处较轻的监禁刑罚、居家监禁或已服刑时间。
根据美国司法部消息，两名被告——米格尔·伊波利托·卡瓦列罗·奥帕特和迭戈·塞瓦略斯-索托——仍在逃。
国土安全部国土安全调查局（HSI）和联邦调查局（FBI）的调查人员牵头开展了此次执法行动，案件由司法部反垄断局、暴力犯罪与敲诈勒索局以及得克萨斯州南区美国检察官办公室的检察官负责起诉。
如果罪名成立，布朗面临的刑罚将是每项《谢尔曼反托拉斯法》指控最高10年监禁和100万美元罚款。
目前尚不清楚他是否有律师可以为其辩护。
Inside “the Pool”: Fugitive arrested in alleged scheme to control cross-border car trade
August 14, 2026 / 1:00 PM EDT / CBS News
By
Along the Texas-Mexico border, it’s known as “the Pool.” And this week, federal authorities say they caught one of the men accused of helping run it.
Every year, drivers known as transmigrantes transport used cars bought in the United States through Mexico to be resold in Central America. Federal prosecutors say a group of South Texas businessmen found a way to monopolize the industry that took those cars across the border — fixing the fees, pooling their revenues and squeezing businesses that refused to comply.
At the center of the scheme, authorities say, was Carlos Martinez, a Mission, Texas, businessman known as “Cuate” who controlled the transmigrante forwarding agency near the Los Indios border crossing in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley. Prosecutors allege Martinez — the son-in-law of a former notorious Gulf Cartel leader — helped turn a cluster of supposedly competing businesses into a tightly controlled network of fixed prices, shared revenue, cash payments and intimidation. He pleaded guilty to federal charges and was sentenced to prison time.
Working alongside him, prosecutors allege, was Rigoberto Brown, a dual U.S.-Mexican citizen who served in managerial roles on Martinez’s behalf, helping him pull off the alleged scheme. Brown was charged in November 2022 with conspiring to fix prices and divide the market and with conspiring to monopolize the transmigrante forwarding business. Then he disappeared.
For nearly four years, authorities say, Brown lived as a fugitive in Mexico. This week, they caught him near McAllen, Texas. He is set to be arraigned Friday in federal court in Houston.
An alleged price-fixing “empresa”
For years, much of the traffic moved by transmigrantes was funneled through one place.
Before March 2021, Mexican regulations required commerce to enter Mexico through the Los Indios Port of Entry in South Texas, according to the federal indictment. That created a concentrated industry around the crossing, where forwarding agencies helped drivers handle the customs paperwork and other requirements needed to get their vehicles into Mexico.
Thousands of vehicles moved through the system, generating millions of dollars a year in forwarding agency revenue, according to prosecutors. Federal authorities allege a group of operators found a way to control it.
Beginning as early as 2011, prosecutors say, forwarding agencies agreed on prices instead of competing for customers, choosing to inflate prices and divide the market among themselves.
Participating businesses allegedly collected their revenues centrally and divided the money according to agreed-upon percentages. Prosecutors say the operation was so organized, participants used charts and spreadsheets to keep track of the arrangement and communicated about prices and revenues throughout meetings and in calls, texts and exchanges on social media and messaging applications.
Some participants referred to the collective enterprise as the “empresa” — Spanish for “the company” — according to the indictment. But prosecutors say controlling prices was only one part of the operation.
Vehicles carrying secondhand cars and other goods line up in Los Indios, Texas, as they prepare to go through Mexico on Dec. 19, 2006. Many of the transmigrantes come from as far as Washington, New York and California. AP/Valley Morning Star, Gabe Hernandez
The “piso”
According to federal prosecutors, alleged conspirators also controlled relationships with licensed Mexican customs brokers whose services were required to process the transmigrante paperwork. The special arrangement allegedly gave them leverage over businesses outside the group.
Agencies without the special broker relationships were allegedly coerced into operating through agencies controlled by members of the conspiracy, according to the indictment, while some outsiders were also pushed into the Pool, forced to follow its prices and revenue-sharing rules.
The term “piso” — Spanish for “floor” — is used in the case to describe an alleged extortion payment imposed on vehicles crossing the Los Indios bridge.
Prosecutors allege one forwarding agency owner was forced to pay more than $80,000 after operating outside the Pool and failing to pay the alleged tax.
Those who resisted faced more than economic pressure, according to the government.
The indictment alleges that threats and intimidation were used to enforce the arrangement — including acts of violence directed against industry participants, their families, employees, associates and businesses.
Prosecutors add that the goal was fear: discouraging businesses already in the market from breaking ranks and dissuading outsiders from posing a challenge to the group.
A fugitive returns
Brown was charged in November 2022 with conspiring to fix prices and allocate the market, which is considered a violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Act, as well as conspiring to monopolize the market in violation of Section 2. The Sherman Antitrust Act was passed in 1890 to give federal authorities a tool to target large corporate monopolies, and the law is primarily used for that purpose today.
After he was indicted more than three years ago, Brown hid out in Mexico, authorities say, until his arrest this week near McAllen. His capture comes after so much of the case has played out in federal court, and eight of Brown’s co-defendants have already been sentenced.
Martinez, for instance, received the harshest punishment: 11 years in federal prison and a $2 million criminal fine after pleading guilty to conspiring to fix prices and allocate the market, conspiring to monopolize, conspiring to interfere with commerce through extortion and conspiring to launder money.
Other defendants received lesser prison sentences, home detention or time served after pleading guilty to charges stemming from the sweeping investigation.
Two defendants, Miguel Hipolito Caballero Aupart and Diego Ceballos-Soto, remain fugitives, according to the Justice Department.
Investigators from the Department of Homeland Security’s Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and the FBI led the law enforcement operation, while the case has been prosecuted by attorneys from the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division, the department’s Violent Crime and Racketeering Section and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Texas.
If convicted, Brown faces up to 10 years in prison and a $1 million fine on each Sherman Act charge.
It wasn’t immediately clear if he had an attorney who could speak on his behalf.