
Zimbabwean man caught smuggling drugs between area southeast of Hope, B.C., and Washington
ROSS LAKE/NORTH CASCADES NATIONAL PARK — A Zimbabwean citizen has pleaded guilty to gun and drug crimes after he illegally crossed into the U.S. from Canada, between an area southeast of Hope, B.C., and Western Washington, on two occasions with the intent to distribute narcotics.
According to a statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Western District of Washington, 30-year-old Tatenda Banga was observed twice in 2024 on surveillance cameras near Hozomeen, Washington, south of Ross Lake in the North Cascades. Banga, who crossed illegally from Canada into Washington State, pleaded guilty on Thursday, March 13 to being an unlawful alien in possession of firearms and possession of controlled substances with intent to distribute. Banga is facing a scheduling hearing before U.S. District Judge Jamal N. Whitehead later this year in June 2025.
According to federal prosecutors, U.S. Border Patrol detection technology captured an image of an armed person entering the U.S. near the north end of Ross Lake near Hozomeen, Washington, on January 3, 2024. The image revealed a person, later identified as Banga, crossing over the border with a long-arm shotgun. Authorities say later that day, Banga is seen defacing another camera near the border. Border Patrol and National Park Service officers responded and searched for the person depicted in the surveillance, but the subject fled into the woods and was not located. Agents located a loaded 12-gauge Winchester shotgun that appeared to match the gun in the surveillance image that the subject left behind during his flight from law enforcement. The gun was traced to a firearms dealer in Montreal, Quebec, but no fingerprint records matching those on the gun were found at the time.
On December 27, 2024, the National Park Service alerted Border Patrol officers to suspected cross border activity. Border Patrol agents assigned to the Bellingham station had received information that a stolen canoe had crossed the international boundary on the north end of Ross Lake. Authorities discovered a National Park Service canoe near Ross Dam with a machete and food wrappers inside the canoe. Authorities say RCMP cameras provided an image of someone with a headlamp and backpack moving toward the U.S./Canada border.