A different kind of crime has seeped across the border between the United States and Mexico: express kidnapping.

Popular with small gangs looking to extort some fast cash, express kidnapping has been a part of the crime scene in most Mexican cities for years. However, a recent bust in Houston has brought this drive-through crime into the spotlight in America.

Express kidnapping entails snatching an innocent off the street and forcing him to empty his bank accounts via an atm, after which the perpetrators call family members to extract a ransom, usually a few thousand dollars. Afterward, victims are threatened and released.

“[T]he kidnappers threaten to kill their victims if they go to law enforcement authorities. They often steal the victims’ identification documents to learn their home addresses and tell them they know how to find them if the police are told about the crimes,” reported the Houston Chronicle. Because victims often fear for their lives and don’t report the incidents, the extent of express kidnappings in America is largely unknown.

In Latin American countries, where express kidnappings have been perfected, kidnappers often don’t bother with threats but simply execute their victims.

Express kidnapping gangs are content to make only a few thousand dollars on each crime. Instead of targeting only the rich, as most kidnappers do, express kidnappers can make quick money from almost anyone on the street. The average middle-class American could find himself a victim of kidnapping as easily as those living in mansions.

This influx of violent criminals from south of the border is one more bitter result of the waves of illegal immigrants coming into the country, many of whom have no respect for the laws in America.