"How likely would it be that you could get that quantity over the border going South? Is luggage checked?"

I can only speak from personal experience, but ...

As someone who has driven into, and through, Mexico many, many times (one trip was Colorado to El Salvador and back) I can tell you that it's all smiles and waves and thumbs up as long as you are driving south.

As long as you're driving south, nobody cares what you're doing or what's up or where you're going or who you are.

The moment you turn around and point north everyone cares.

I assumed as much. I suppose he would've wanted to have done it quickly before his photo was out there. Maybe stash half and risk carrying the other half.

Or, as I said, get to a more remote area, make friends, rent a room cheap, befriend the landlord and try to borrow their car for cash, and then slowly develop a lifestyle where you can make careful use of the money without divulging your identity too much.

I think it depends on the border crossing. At San Ysidro you can walk across and probably not get checked. I've walked across into mexico there a number of times (visa runs for TN) and never been checked, not even my passport. Granted I didn't have a bag with me. They tend to have a couple of guards who seem to check people occasionally, but I suspect if you were to walk across with a backpack behind a group of old ladies with luggage you'd probably be ok.

I drove over the border, perhaps Brownsville? I forget the name, but one of the last eastern border crossings.

Drove over in a camper van with European plates, didn't even realise had left the US until got to the Mexican side and went and sorted papers for the vehicle. No search, no check, just passports

> How likely would it be that you could get that quantity over the border going South?

I've been to Mexico dozens of times and only once was anything checked at all.

If you arrive to México in a plane you can expect random searches. I get my luggage opened around 1 in 10 times. They also use x-ray for screening luggage on arrival. If you are driving or walking sometimes you just say hello and that's about it. But I also have gotten my car searched, specially if crossing by myself. It is a bit more relaxed on Christmas time, when a lot of people cross the border.

I am sure he could have just mailed it UPS, FEDEX or something.

That’s an interesting idea.

The Mexicans would've stopped him. That's why he didn't take the money with him. In his case he would've need to do a reverse coyote which I am going to guess is basically impossible with $1.2m. A boat to Cuba maybe with a flight but otherwise impossible. His best chance outside of friends or family was bitcoin.

I would guess that, however one goes about converting a million dollars of physical cash into bitcoin, it has just as many downsides as his other options.

I saw offers of cash through the mail for bitcoin on some dark net markets, back when I was fascinated with the Silk Road case.

I'm pretty sure his Russian gold fence could have set him up with bitcoin instead of cash in the first place, though.

Yikes. Bitcoin: the best for illegal transactions. That's not a positive attribute.

Might be a good thing for bitcoin (heh) if that surprises you. That was pretty much it's public face for a long time thanks to the Silk Road and various mainstream pieces about money laundering.

Actually it doesn't surprise me that much. Parents asked when bitcoin was around 10k on the way up if they should invest. I told them there will probably be value for a while because it is a money laundering Mecca, but definitely risky. For a while (up to 19k+) I thought I might have burned significant tech trust.

money laundering via bitcoin, is overhyped and not as much of an issue as people make out. cash is always going to be king.

It's not though; it's really a misconception. It's much more traceable than cash. Monero would be what a criminal would use.

Bitcoin (or more specifically, the purchasing power thereof, which is what matters when you are using it as a store if value) gets arbitrarily confiscated too, except it's called "whales dumping" instead of "government seizure". Though I suppose if he stole the money then the risk of a 50% haircut thanks to bring on the wrong side of anonymous pumpers taking profits is no big deal.