Man pleads guilty to illegally crossing Canada-U.S. border with gun, drugs

A canoe was discovered on the south end of Ross Lake with a machete and food wrappers found inside. (Handout)

A 30-year-old man from Zimbabwe has pleaded guilty to illegally crossing the Canada-U.S. border from British Columbia into Washington state twice – once carrying a shotgun and the second time carrying several hundred grams of the drug MDMA.

A statement from the U.S. District Attorney’s office in western Washington says Tatenda Banga pleaded guilty on March 13 to charges of being an unlawful alien in possession of firearms, and possession of controlled substances with intent to distribute.

According to the plea agreement, U.S. Border Patrol cameras photographed a man armed with a shotgun entering the country near the north end of Ross Lake, southeast of Hope, B.C., on Jan. 3, 2024.

Later that day, the same man was photographed defacing another surveillance camera near the border, according to the document.

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Border Patrol agents and officers from the U.S. National Park Service responded to the area to search for the man but he had fled into the woods and was not located, according to the attorney’s office.

Authorities did find a loaded 12-gauge Winchester shotgun that matched the one from the surveillance image, which the man “left behind during his flight from law enforcement,” according to the statement.

“The gun was traced to a firearms dealer in Montreal, but no fingerprint records matching those on the gun were found at the time,” the attorney’s office said.

Almost a year went by before a canoe was discovered on the south end of the lake, near Ross Dam, with a machete and food wrappers found inside.

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The local sheriff’s office in Whatcom County, Wash., says the canoe was believed to have been stolen and later used to smuggle drugs across the lake from Canada to the U.S.

The discovery of the canoe on Dec. 27, 2024, was linked to an image captured by RCMP surveillance cameras, showing someone wearing a headlamp and a backpack moving toward the Canada-U.S. border, according to the attorney’s office.

Border Patrol agents apprehended a suspect who matched the description of the person captured on the RCMP camera while he was walking on the side of a highway near the south of Ross Lake.

According to the attorney’s office, the man did not have any documents indicating he was legally in the U.S. The local sheriff’s office says he was carrying a Canadian driver’s licence identifying him as Tatenda Banga.

The man was taken into custody and found to be carrying 635 grams (1.4 pounds) of MDMA, as well as scales and gelatin capsules, according to the attorney’s office.

“It was then that Border Patrol agents recognized Banga as being the same individual who was recorded defacing cameras in the area nearly a year prior,” said Teal Luthy Miller, the acting U.S. attorney in western Washington.

“Border Patrol agents reran the fingerprints found on the shotgun that was recovered on the U.S. side of the border back in January 2024, and the fingerprints on the gun matched to Banga.”

The attorney’s office says information found on Banga’s phone also linked him to the weapon.

Being an unlawful alien in possession of a firearm is punishable by up to 15 years in prison, while possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute is punishable by up to 20 years in prison, according to the attorney’s office.

Banga is scheduled to be sentenced in a Seattle courtroom on June 12.