SIERRA BLANCA, Texas – Nestled among the few remaining businesses that dot a rundown highway in this dusty west Texas town stands what’s become a surprise destination for marijuana-toting celebrities: the Hudspeth County Jail.

Willie Nelson, Snoop Dogg and actor Armie Hammer have been among the thousands of people busted for possession at a Border Patrol checkpoint outside town in recent years, bringing a bit of notoriety to one of Texas’ most sparsely populated counties.

“Once I was in Arizona, and when I said where I was from, they said, ‘That’s where Willie Nelson was busted,’ ” said Louise Barantley, manager at the Coyote Sunset souvenir shop in Sierra Blanca.

Locals have found ways to rub shoulders with their celebrity guests.

Deputies posed for pictures with Snoop Dogg after authorities said they found several joints on his bus earlier this month. When Nelson was busted here in 2010, the county’s lead prosecutor suggested the singer settle his marijuana charges by performing “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain” for the court. Nelson paid a fine instead, but not before county commissioner Wayne West played one of his own songs for the country music legend.

The once-thriving town of Sierra Blanca began to shrink to its current population of 1,000 after the construction of Interstate 10 offered an easy way to bypass the community.

Now the highway is sending about 2,000 cases a year Sierra Blanca’s way, courtesy of a Border Patrol checkpoint just outside of town where drug-sniffing dogs inspect more than 17,000 trucks, travelers – and tour buses – daily for whiffs of contraband that may have made its way inland from the border.