San Diego- A 21-year-old Torrey Pines High School graduate who once lived in Rancho Santa Fe was sentenced to 10 months in federal prison for agreeing to smuggle marijuana in her car for $500.
Jhuliana Cohen, who was living with her mother in Tijuana, used a special lane for frequent border crossers at the San Ysidro Port of Entry in a June 22 attempt to smuggle 202 pounds of marijuana. She wept and promised a federal court judge in San Diego that she would not break the law again.
Her stepfather, Stephen Michael Cohen, was arrested last Thursday in Tijuana and handed over to U.S. officials, who had a warrant for his arrest.
A federal judge in San Jose has found him in contempt of court for failing to appear in a civil lawsuit over the theft of a pornographic Web site.
Stephen Cohen was ordered in 2001 to pay $65 million to the man from whom he stole sex.com by using a forged business letter. A judge found that Cohen used the Web site to make millions of dollars.
Stephen Cohen has not been implicated in the drug operation.
Gary Kremen, the founder of sex.com, attended Jhuliana Cohen’s sentencing. He said he felt sorry for her, calling her “a pawn” in the drug smuggling.
Kremen also is suing her, claiming she helped her stepfather hide some of his ill-gotten gains. He said she may not have known that her stepfather put his purchases of Tijuana real estate and a strip club in her name.
Prosecutor Valerie Chu asked Judge Gordon Thompson Jr. to sentence Cohen to 18 months, but he sided with defense lawyer Mark Fleming, who said the smuggling attempt was “aberrant behavior” by his client.
Cohen told investigators she agreed to smuggle the marijuana for a man named “Juan” she met at a bar.
She was caught with the drugs as she tried to use the SENTRI lane to get into the United States. The lane is reserved for people who have passed background checks and promised not to use it to break the law.
So how did Jhuliana Cohen, whose stepfather was a wanted man, get permission to use the lane?
“If an individual lives a law-abiding life and is an adult citizen, having a relative who had committed offenses in the past would not necessarily preclude a person from getting a SENTRI pass,” said Vince Bond, a spokesman for Customs and Border Protection.
He said 67,000 people are enrolled in the program, and in the federal fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, eight of them were caught trying to smuggle people or drugs in the special lanes at the San Ysidro and Otay Mesa border crossings.