Agency says getting all people, legal and illegal, to safety is its top priority
By Jim Forsyth
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
The U.S. Border Patrol said today it is not checking the documents of individuals who are fleeing Hurricane Dolly, and it has no intention of using natural disasters as a pretext for rounding up and deporting illegal immigrants, 1200 WOAI news reports.
Officials in the Rio Grande Valley have been worried about Border Patrol actions ever since a reporter spotted a Border Patrol official conducting a document check during a hurricane evacuation drill in McAllen in May. Some officials had expressed concern that Rio Grande Valley residents, many of whom have relatives who are undocumented, would decline to evacuate if they knew a relative could be deported.
"Our goal is to make sure that people understand that we are not going to stop people from boarding modes of evacuation to check their citizenship or anything like that," Border Patrol Agent Lloyd Easterling told 1200 WOAI news. "We will not...will not..be impeding anybody who needs to be evacuated."
Easterling says the check points at Sarita and Falfurrias, which everybody driving north from the Rio Grande Valley have to pass through to leave the Valley, are open and are operating today, but there are no indications that any large number of people are leaving the Rio Grande Valley. Hundreds have left their homes, but they are seeking shelter inland in the Valley, in San Benito, Weslaco, and Edinburg.
"As members of that community, we are going to be out there making sure that people of all nationalities are safe and those lives are preserved. That's what our mission is."
Easterling said in the event of a major evacuation from the Rio Grande Valley, the officers in charge of the checkpoints would not impede traffic by checking documents.
But Easterling said the law enforcement aspect of the Border Patrol's work will continue. If the Border Patrol sees a 'wanted felon' or is told by another police agencies that a wanted individual is in an evacuation area, that person will be arrested. But he says the agency will not be entering evacuation busses or checking the papers of streams of evacuees at the checkpoints.
"We're going to be down there in a support role to help people get out of the impact zone, and get them into areas were they are safe, and their lives are not imperiled," he said.
Showing posts with label Falfurrias. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Falfurrias. Show all posts
June 27, 2008
Migrant deaths up sharply in South Texas
June 27, 2008, 1:44PM
© 2008 The Associated Press
HOUSTON — The number of dead immigrants found in South Texas has already surpassed last year's total heading into the two hottest months of 2008.
Since the start of the fiscal year in October, Border Patrol's Rio Grande Valley sector has found 67 bodies after recovering 61 all of the previous year. The sector runs through the three easternmost counties along the Rio Grande and north along the Gulf of Mexico to almost Victoria.
It is not clear why the deaths are up in the sector. Border Patrol officials point to tougher border security in Arizona, a long string of days with temperatures approaching 100 degrees and smugglers they say don't care for their human cargo.
"It has already hit 104 (degrees)," said Daniel Doty, a spokesman for the Border Patrol's sector, said in Friday's editions of the Houston Chronicle.
"It is generally a three-day walk around the checkpoint, and they are told it is just a few hours," he said of the Border Patrol's checkpoints on two northbound highways. "We've got these smugglers saying it is a short walk, here is a gallon of water."
The Border Patrol has a Search Trauma and Rescue Team that focuses on the sector's most dangerous immigration route through Brooks County.
Immigrants on foot can become disoriented in the heat and vast scrubland north of the border.
"Sometimes (officers) find bones scattered; last month they found three skulls," said Brooks County Sheriff Baldi Lozano, whose county of expansive ranchland is one of the highest-trafficked routes north. "Inside the brush there is no water, no wind blowing."
The most recent body found was Tuesday night six miles south of Falfurrias. A black T-shirt adorned with images of skulls covered the man's face. Only a few religious cards filled his wallet.
The little that immigrants tend to travel with can make it difficult to identify their bodies.
That posed an additional challenge for an illegal immigrant who made it to Houston this week and tried to alert someone to look for a woman she had traveled with but who died along the way.
The woman, who identified herself as Karina but asked to remain anonymous, said she and the other woman fell behind a larger group of immigrants guided by a smuggler.
She tried to help the other woman but she collapsed and died, perhaps from a scorpion sting or snake bite, Karina said.
Now she is trying to make sure the body is found and sent back to Honduras.
"I want to get word to her family," Karina said. "They should know what happened to her so they can retrieve the body."
© 2008 The Associated Press
HOUSTON — The number of dead immigrants found in South Texas has already surpassed last year's total heading into the two hottest months of 2008.
Since the start of the fiscal year in October, Border Patrol's Rio Grande Valley sector has found 67 bodies after recovering 61 all of the previous year. The sector runs through the three easternmost counties along the Rio Grande and north along the Gulf of Mexico to almost Victoria.
It is not clear why the deaths are up in the sector. Border Patrol officials point to tougher border security in Arizona, a long string of days with temperatures approaching 100 degrees and smugglers they say don't care for their human cargo.
"It has already hit 104 (degrees)," said Daniel Doty, a spokesman for the Border Patrol's sector, said in Friday's editions of the Houston Chronicle.
"It is generally a three-day walk around the checkpoint, and they are told it is just a few hours," he said of the Border Patrol's checkpoints on two northbound highways. "We've got these smugglers saying it is a short walk, here is a gallon of water."
The Border Patrol has a Search Trauma and Rescue Team that focuses on the sector's most dangerous immigration route through Brooks County.
Immigrants on foot can become disoriented in the heat and vast scrubland north of the border.
"Sometimes (officers) find bones scattered; last month they found three skulls," said Brooks County Sheriff Baldi Lozano, whose county of expansive ranchland is one of the highest-trafficked routes north. "Inside the brush there is no water, no wind blowing."
The most recent body found was Tuesday night six miles south of Falfurrias. A black T-shirt adorned with images of skulls covered the man's face. Only a few religious cards filled his wallet.
The little that immigrants tend to travel with can make it difficult to identify their bodies.
That posed an additional challenge for an illegal immigrant who made it to Houston this week and tried to alert someone to look for a woman she had traveled with but who died along the way.
The woman, who identified herself as Karina but asked to remain anonymous, said she and the other woman fell behind a larger group of immigrants guided by a smuggler.
She tried to help the other woman but she collapsed and died, perhaps from a scorpion sting or snake bite, Karina said.
Now she is trying to make sure the body is found and sent back to Honduras.
"I want to get word to her family," Karina said. "They should know what happened to her so they can retrieve the body."
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