Sheriff Mark J. Dannels of Cochise County, Arizona, sees a sharp increase in the influx of illegal immigrants crossing the border from Mexico, many carrying illegal drugs including fentanyl for that country’s infamous drug cartel.

Cochise County - the largest in the United States - shares an 84-mile long border with Mexico.

In 2022, Cochise County’s array of border cameras caught 66,620 illegal immigrants crossing into the United States. About 25,500 were apprehended.

Dannels, who also leads the Border Security Committee for the National Sheriffs’ Association, was the keynote speaker Saturday at Schuylkill County Coroner David J. Moylan’s ninth annual forensic symposium.

The conference was held at the Simon Kramer Cancer Institute, New Philadelphia, where Moylan has his offices.

The daylong symposium drew a number of people involved in law enforcement, medical, and emergency services.

The border crisis, as Dannels describes it, has hit frighteningly close to home.

Dannels’ son, a police officer, shot to death a cartel member with a long criminal history as he sped toward him, intending to run him down after a traffic stop.

Dannels’ family and deputies were threatened with death after the incident, he said.

The next day, his assistant called to say his office had gotten a phone call from a town in Mexico.

“Tell your sheriff we’re going to kill him,” the caller said.

They also called his son’s department with the same threat.

A day later, around midnight, he looked out the window to see three deputies running past his house.

A neighbor had alerted police to the fact that two men were lurking in back of his house, one on the patio.

Dannels and the deputies gave chase, but the men escaped into the desert.

“Cartels are just ruthless,” Dannels said.

The cartel is powerful on both sides of the border, he said.

Those trying to cross into the United States are required to pay the cartel $2,500 each.

“No one crosses from Mexico into this country unless they pay that organization first,” he said.

But it’s not only the bad guys Dannels worries about.

Not all of the people smuggled into the United States survive. His deputies often find the remains.

Dannels, an outspoken critic of President Joe Biden, blames him for the surge in border crossings.

Biden halted construction of a border fence, and his administration has pulled back on support for border enforcement.

Nonetheless, Dannels urged people to put aside political differences and work together to secure the border.

“When it comes to protecting people, we’re all in this together,” he said. “And if we turn our heads on this, shame on us.”

In the absence of a continuous wall, Cochise County relies on 1,200 strategically placed solar powered cameras, drones and other tracking equipment to spot and find illegal immigrants.

The border cameras help, Dannels said, but the increase in illegal immigrants also means an increase in the numbers of “mules,” people paid to carry controlled substances into the country.

According to Customs and Border Protection information, seizures of fentanyl at ports of entry rose more than 200 percent since 2021, with 14,699 pounds seized in fiscal year 2022.

Along with Dannels, the symposium featured Monroe County District Attorney’s Office Detective Kim Lippincott, who spoke about the intricacies of crime scene investigations. She’s also co-coordinator of the Monroe County Drug Task Force.

Foster Township Police Chief James Nettles spoke about death investigations, and Deputy Coroner Erin M. Cuff spoke about designer drugs.

Designer drugs are knock-offs of controlled substances, with their molecular structure changed just a bit to avoid the drug being able to meet the chemical description of the actually controlled substance.

She spoke of the dangers of “pink cocaine,” a synthetic drug that is used as a “party drug.” It can cause severe hallucinations, anxiety, and violent behavior.

Grace Coffin, chairwoman of the county’s Suicide Prevention Task Force, spoke about the increasing need for prevention and awareness efforts in light of Schuylkill’s rising numbers of suicides. The county, she said, has the fourth highest number of people taking their own lives in the state.

Virginia Krieger, co-president of Lost Voices of Fentanyl, spoke of the heart-wrenching death of her daughter, Tiffany Robertson, who had advanced to the semifinal auditions of American Idol.

Robertson, of Ohio, then 26, died in February 2015 after taking a pill aced with the deadly drug.

Moylan also spoke, giving insights into the use of postmortem CT scans.

Moylan is among a few in the United States to routinely use the scans, which are done in advance of a physical autopsy. The results of the scans help coroners decide whether to perform a full autopsy or other testing.