A new Texas law makes it easier to prosecute human smugglers by removing the requirement to prove the intent to obtain a “pecuniary benefit.” The bill also makes it a 3rd Degree Felony to “assist, guide, or direct” migrants to enter or remain on agricultural land without the consent of the owner.
A young migrant woman from El Salvador died after being struck by a vehicle early Tuesday morning as she attempted to cross a highway in a well-known human smuggling area. The woman appeared to be running toward a ranch to circumvent the U.S. Border Patrol checkpoint located on U.S. Highway 281 in Brooks County, Texas.
Border Patrol agents arrested multiple sex offenders and gang members along the southwest border with Mexico. Those arrested include sex offenders, violent criminals, and members of gangs.
Del Rio Sector Border Patrol agents rescued a group of migrants locked inside a railcar in Eagle Pass, Texas. Border Patrol officials in the Del Rio and Laredo Sectors report increases in the use of trains to smuggle migrants.
A female migrant died while attempting to escape from a Border Patrol agent near downtown Laredo, Texas. Agents arrested the woman after she illegally entered the United States. After slipping out of handcuffs, she ran into the darkness and fell from a 20-foot cliff and died from her injuries.
More than 2,000 mostly Haitian and Venezuelan migrants crossed the Rio Grande at Del Rio, Texas, during the past week. Several hundred migrants remain at the river’s edge awaiting transport and processing due to logistical problems plaguing the Border Patrol.
Human smugglers assaulted a San Diego Sector Border Patrol agent with a board. The attack occurred as the female agent attempted to confiscate a ladder used by the smugglers to move people over the wall.
The Border Patrol announced it will begin construction of another soft-sided migrant detention facility in response to the continuing surge of illegal border crossings. The facility in Laredo, Texas, like others recently constructed along the state’s border with Mexico, will accommodate 500 migrants and will be completed in late September.
Laredo Sector Border Patrol agents and local police officers discovered 120 migrants locked inside an abandoned tractor-trailer rig late last month. The group included five unaccompanied minors.
Border Patrol agents in South Texas teamed up with state and local law enforcement to interdict several human smuggling operations, one ending with an armed suspect.
The number of migrants crossing the border without being apprehended soared to more than 340,000 migrants so far this Fiscal Year 2021, according to a U.S. Customs and Border Protection source. This figure represents an estimate of the total number of migrants believed to have escaped into the U.S. interior without capture or apprehension by Border Patrol agents.
Rio Grande Valley Sector Border Patrol agents and local law enforcement officials found the bodies or skeletal remains of more than 100 migrants so far this fiscal year.
Tucson Sector Border Patrol agents apprehended more than 120 migrants from four countries who illegally crossed the Mexican border into Arizona. The agents apprehended the migrants came from two groups apprehended within a 48-hour period.
Tucson Sector Border Patrol agents found 10 migrants being smuggled in a fake Border Patrol SUV. The driver also wore a cloned uniform.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott announced the authorization for Texas National Guard troops to make arrests for violations of Texas law. The governor is also “surging” additional guardsmen to the border region. Abbott indicated troopers will be working with Texas Department of Public Safety troopers and local law enforcement authorities at the border to increase security.
Yuma Sector Border Patrol agents apprehended about 1,100 migrants over the weekend who illegally crossed the border from Mexico. Officials report the migrants “breached the old primary fence.”
Human smuggling pursuits and the apprehension of migrants are now daily episodes for a Texas sheriff’s office located 200 miles from the Mexican border. Refugio County Sheriff Raul “Pinky” Gonzales says the trend shifted from a couple of times per month to a daily grind for his deputies since January.
For a second time in as many days, Hutchinson County Sheriff Blaik Kemp and his deputies were forced to release migrants after federal officials refused to take them into custody. Sheriff’s office officials released the migrants, 24 in all, after Kemp exhausted all efforts to get assistance from federal agencies. Deputies arrested two suspects and charged them with Trafficking of Persons among other charges.
Arrests of migrants with previous convictions for sexual offenses jumped 171 percent during the first 10 months of Fiscal Year 2021, according to a report from U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Agents apprehended 423 criminal aliens with convictions for sexual offenses as of July 31.
Tucson Sector Border Patrol agents apprehended a group of 140 mostly Guatemalan migrants after human smugglers put them into the Arizona desert. The group included more than 80 unaccompanied children.
A previously deported Mexican national is in a Tennessee county jail awaiting charges related to the alleged rape of a child. Immigration officers reportedly deported the subject twice following violent crimes including charges for drugs, domestic assault, and molestation of a child.
On Monday, a dispatcher working for the Refugio County Sheriff’s Office (RCSO) answered two 911 emergency calls coming from a local convenience store. The distressed callers described cries for help and banging noises coming from the back of a U-Haul cargo rental truck.
An El Centro Sector Border Patrol Horse Patrol Unit rescued eight migrants who became lost in the desert after illegally crossing from Mexico. The rescue of the four adults and four minors came from the successful coordination of efforts between the Government of Mexico and U.S. Border Patrol.
A Border Patrol K-9 team carrying out train inspections in the Del Rio Sector found a toddler and his mother locked inside a grain-hopper rail car. The mother and son were without food or water in triple-digit temperatures.
Border Patrol agents assigned to the Rio Grande City Station apprehended more than 1,000 migrants in a few hours last week. This occurred as Rio Grande Valley Sector agents apprehended more than 4,000 in a single day.
Border Patrol agents in the five Texas-based sectors apprehended 146,212 migrants in July who illegally crossed the border from Texas. This represents more than 73 percent of all migrants apprehended last month in the nine southwest border sectors. It also represents an increase of percent over June’s 126,485 apprehensions.
Border Patrol officials in the Texas Rio Grande Valley announced a new sector record for the apprehension of migrants in a 24-hour period. The apprehensions, which were recorded on Thursday, totaled nearly 4,000 throughout the day. Ironically, the record-breaking apprehensions occurred on the very day Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas visited the area to get a firsthand look at conditions on the ground in South Texas.
Border Patrol agents apprehended nearly 200,000 migrants who illegally crossed the border from Mexico during the month of July. This represents an increase of more than 418 percent over the same month last year and a 12 percent increase over the previous 21-year-high mark set in June.
Texas border community leaders are set to meet with Biden Administration officials and will reportedly ask for a moratorium on releasing additional migrants from federal custody.
Human smugglers moved an unaccompanied six-year-old across the Arizona border from Mexico and then abandoned the boy.
Border Patrol agents in the nation’s busiest sector, the Rio Grande Valley, apprehended more than 320 migrants in two groups during a 24-hour period.
The Biden Administration and the City of Laredo, Texas, reached an agreement to end a lawsuit over the Border Patrol’s transfer of migrants from the Rio Grande Valley to the border city. The agreements will reportedly result in the City of Laredo busing released migrants to major Texas cities without being tested for COVID-19, according to Mayor Pete Saenz.
Border Patrol agents along the southwestern U.S. border with Mexico continue to find deported sex offenders and other criminal migrants hiding in large groups. Over the weekend, agents in the Yuma and Rio Grande Valley sector made multiple such arrests.
The Biden Administration is holding what appears to be thousands of migrants in what the ACLU calls an “inhumane outdoor pen.” Rio Grande Valley Sector Border Patrol officials are being forced to store recently apprehended migrants under the Anzalduas International Bridge near Mission, Texas, because of overcrowding in processing centers.
Surveillance video released by Yuma Sector Border Patrol officials revealed a group of 85 migrants illegally entering the U.S. late last week. The group included 35 children.
The Kinney County Sheriff’s Office posted images of 17 migrants booked in jail after illegally crossing the border from Mexico. The migrants were arrested by state police following an emergency declaration by Texas Governor Greg Abbott.
A leaked presidential briefing document reported on by NBC News revealed that 20 percent of unaccompanied migrant children who illegally crossed the border are testing positive for COVID-19 after being released into communities by Border Patrol. The report covers the last two to three weeks of data prepared for President Joe Biden, NBC says.
Many hotels and motels in downtown McAllen, Texas, bustled with migrants on Saturday who had been recently released by Border Patrol officials. Medical personnel checked on many of the migrants on the hotel grounds.
A Florida resident paced outside a non-government migrant shelter in McAllen, Texas, on Friday hoping to see a friend’s family members. Vicky, who did not want to provide a last name, expressed displeasure at the disorganized conditions at the shelter, the spreading of COVID-19, and the lack of information needed to locate the family members inside.
A San Diego Sector Border Patrol marine unit interdicted a human smuggling vessel off the coast of California and led to the apprehension of 16 migrants.
