Fitzgerald, who is now a law student and whistleblower advocate, is very familiar with Carman. Their paths crossed in the late 1990s when Fitzgerald was working an investigation into a major drug-smuggling operation in Southern California.

The smugglers, she discovered, were using railcars to move tons of dope from Mexico into the United States.

Fitzgerald claims that she was in contact with Carman recently and they discussed his private investigator case involving the woman traveling to Playa del Carmen, Mexico. Fitzgerald adds that she was shocked to learn that the FBI had since arrested Carman as a result of his work on that case. She claims the case had nothing to do with kidnapping.

“I had a conversation with John and he was very concerned about the family, and the woman, who he believed had a meth problem,” she says. “He thought he could do something good. They (the family) didn’t have a lot of money, but he tried to help anyway.”

Fitzgerald adds that she wonders why that conversation was not recorded by the FBI, so that there would be some context to what was going on.

“It’s selective recording I’m sure,” she contends.

Fitzgerald, in her mind, has far more reason than just her recent conversation with Carman to doubt the word of the government.

She alleges that the railcar investigation she undertook in the late 1990s was “torpedoed” by the brass at Customs, without explanation. She suspects the investigation was shut down because of corruption within the federal agency — which has since become a part of the Department of Homeland Security.

The dope Fitzgerald had uncovered was being delivered as part of an operation run by the Arellano-Felix narco-trafficking organization in Tijuana, Mexico; the drugs (tons of pot and coke) were being shipped across the border via a rail yard in Guadalajara, Mexico.

The railcars moved into the United States unchecked, and then along rail routes up the West Coast — where the dope was to be retrieved by narco-organization affiliates and sold for millions of dollars on the streets of America.

Fitzgerald described how the investigation was sabotaged in a statement she submitted to Congress in 2001:

As I attempted to move forward in these two criminal cases (both under the umbrella of Operation -----), my Customs managers began to torpedo my efforts. In the seizure of the pressurized tanker car containing the 8 thousand pounds of marijuana and 32 kilos of cocaine, I attempted to conduct a controlled delivery to San Bernardino, CA.

Much to AUSA [Assistant U.S. Attorney] Palazuelos’ and my surprise and dismay, our efforts were completely thwarted/torpedoed by Customs management. This was just the tip of the iceberg. I was completely undermined repeatedly in my efforts to continue this large and thus far successful rail operation. My help was pulled, my surveillance was pulled, and I was submitted to one frivolous Internal Affairs investigation after another.

… Subsequently, I refused to give into the extreme pressure/harassment that I was under, and continued on with my investigations. I had identified five more suspect pressurized tanker cars. I had solid information that these cars were highly suspect, and should have been inspected.  I routed the cars to the Colton UP rail yard where they were weighed. These cars were manifested as empty, and were 5 to 9 TONS OVER MANUFACTURERS LIGHT WEIGHT. I had it all set up to have them pressure tested, and was ordered off the case.

Senior Special Agent Robert Mattivi (retired), and UP Special Agent Robert Nett both witnessed that my RAIC (Resident Agent In Charge) --------------, ordered me not to do my job. Subsequently, these cars were released into the commerce of the U.S. without being inspected.

With the overwhelming amount of evidence that these cars were loaded with narcotics, THESE TANKER CARS SHOULD HAVE NEVER LEFT THAT RAIL YARD WITHOUT FURTHER REVIEW!!!!!!!

Fitzgerald, along with U.S. Customs special agent Sandy Nunn, and John Carman (then a U.S. Customs inspector) as well as several other federal agents, decided to blow the whistle on the torpedoed operation, hoping to get someone within Customs or the FBI to investigate why it was shut down.

Fitzgerald says she and her fellow agents went to the FBI in the spring of 1999 to report their concerns. She also contacted the U.S. Office of Special Counsel, which is an independent federal agency charged with investigating governmental misconduct.

Fitzgerald and Nunn allege that after they began blowing the whistle on the torpedoed investigation, their lives were turned upside down due to the retaliation and emotional abuse they were subjected to by their supervisors. That abuse, Nunn claims in a statement she submitted to Congress in 2001, included “unrelenting retaliation, adverse actions against us, false accusations of wrongdoing, frivolous Internal Affairs investigations, surveillances, threats against us, (and) slander of our reputations in the workplace.”

In one case, Nunn alleges in the congressional statement, a fellow Customs agent involved in seeking to expose the corruption, Ruben Sandoval, “woke up and found two surveillance cameras mounted on light poles on his street pointed directly at his residence.”

“I was shocked and still am at how our civil rights were so blatantly violated by management officials within one of the top federal law enforcement agencies in the United States merely because we stood up and told the truth,” Nunn said in her statement.

Both Fitzgerald and Nunn decided to resign from their jobs in the fall of 1999 and to go public with their allegations — after no action was taken by the FBI or the other federal agencies to which they reported their concerns. The statements to Congress were part of that effort.

Fitzgerald and Nunn also jointly filed a discrimination lawsuit against Customs in U.S. District Court in San Diego, Calif., in March 2001. The lawsuit alleged that they were discriminated against by Customs managers because of their gender and for participating in Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) legal actions while serving as Customs agents. Among the discriminatory acts they accused their managers of committing was withholding recognition, training opportunities, career-advancing work assignments, and promotions, as well as equipment and case support.

Nunn and Fitzgerald's discrimination case went to trial in March 2005, some four years after it was filed. The jury found that the two former agents had failed to show that a “preponderance of the evidence” supported their claims.

The verdict in the discrimination lawsuit, however, does not put to rest the whistleblower claims made by the former federal agents. The alleged cover-up in the railcar case, Fitzgerald claims, continues to be a long train running.