A Wichita, Kansas man has been sentenced to 35 years in federal prison after investigators discovered methamphetamine hidden inside manufactured stone pillars in his vehicle at the Del Rio International Bridge. Juan Antonio Antuna Jr., 32, was convicted on charges of importing methamphetamine and conspiring to import the drug, capping a case that began with a routine border stop and ended with one of the harshest sentences handed down in the region this year.
According to HSI San Antonio, the sentence marks a major blow against cross-border drug smuggling delivered jointly by Homeland Security Investigations Del Rio and CBP South Texas. Antuna concealed the methamphetamine inside manufactured stone pillars loaded into his vehicle, attempting to import roughly 13.36 pounds of the drug before he was caught. HSI San Antonio serves as the principal investigative arm for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security across the Austin-San Antonio-Laredo-RGV region.
Court records reviewed by the U.S. Department of Justice lay out how the scheme unraveled. Antuna arrived at the Del Rio International Bridge on March 16 driving a white van bearing Mexican license plates, presenting a Kansas driver's license and telling border officers he was carrying only merchandise and food products. CBP officers weren't convinced and sent the van to secondary inspection.
Concrete Pedestals Concealed the Drugs
What officers found inside changed everything. Federal inspectors discovered two concrete pedestals hidden in the van that concealed 6.06 kilograms — about 13.36 pounds — of methamphetamine, packed in alongside declared food products and vinyl signs, the Justice Department's account states. It's a smuggling method that has become disturbingly familiar at this particular crossing, where traffickers frequently build dense stone or concrete objects specifically to defeat both visual checks and X-ray screening.
Just months before Antuna's arrest, CBP officers at the same Del Rio Port of Entry intercepted 81.7 pounds of methamphetamine valued at over $730,000 concealed inside stone benches loaded into a Dodge Ram pickup truck, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection. That seizure led to an arrest by Val Verde County Sheriff's deputies. The crossing has also produced the largest methamphetamine bust in its history, a 2022 seizure of 1,337 pounds valued at $11.9 million found hidden inside a commercial tractor-trailer, when officers relied on non-intrusive imaging technology and K-9 units during secondary inspection.
A Jury Trial and a Sentence Matching the Statute's Ceiling
Antuna was convicted by a federal jury in Del Rio on October 31, 2025, following a two-day trial, the Justice Department reported at the time. His prosecution fell under Operation Take Back America, a nationwide Department of Justice initiative targeting drug cartels, illegal border crossings, and transnational criminal organizations that streamlines resources from Project Safe Neighborhoods across southwestern border districts.
Under federal law, importing 500 grams or more of a methamphetamine mixture — or 50 grams or more of pure methamphetamine — carries a mandatory minimum of 10 years and up to life in federal prison, according to the Legal Information Institute. Federal judges calculate guideline sentences above that statutory floor based on drug purity, quantity, and a defendant's role in the offense, which helps explain how Antuna's case resulted in a 35-year term.
Part of a Wider Pattern of Severe Sentences
Antuna's sentence is not an outlier in the Western District of Texas. Federal prosecutors there have secured several multi-decade sentences in Del Rio meth cases this year, including a 30-year sentence for a Houston man caught smuggling 40.5 kilograms of meth at Eagle Pass and a separate 35-year term for a cartel leader handed down in August, per the Justice Department. U.S. District Judges in the district have applied strict federal sentencing guidelines consistently across these border smuggling cases.
The scale of the caseload behind these sentences is enormous. The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Western District of Texas covers 68 counties and 660 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border, routinely filing 200 to 300 federal immigration and drug cases per week this year — a load that ranks the district among the busiest federal judicial venues in the country.
The investigation into Antuna was handled jointly by Homeland Security Investigations Del Rio and U.S. Customs and Border Protection, with Assistant U.S. Attorneys Tyler Fleming and Joseph Duarte II prosecuting the case, the Justice Department said. Questions remain about the specific transnational criminal organization that manufactured the concrete pillars and supplied the methamphetamine, a detail that has not been resolved in court records.
