Two Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents at the border crossing (port of entry) in Douglas, Arizona shot and killed a driver on the night of Feb. 9 after Douglas police officers attempted to stop the man. Apparently trying to pass through the port of entry into Mexico, the driver maneuvered lanes and drove a stolen F-250 pick up into a port booth. “Because of the threat to their lives, the officers took necessary action and each fired one shot,” said CBP spokesperson Brian Levin. CBP has not released any information on the driver, but said he died while being transported to a local hospital. ICE is investigating the shooting. The two agents involved in the incident have been placed on paid administrative leave. (KVOA.com; Arizona Republic, Feb. 10)
On Jan. 26, a stolen pickup truck carrying 13 migrants into the US crashed into a tractor-trailer on a remote two-lane highway about 10 miles north of the Border Patrol checkpoint in Falfurrias, Texas, about 75 miles from the Mexican border. A stop sign at the intersection was apparently missing. Five men and one woman were killed and eight other people were hospitalized with injuries. Most of the injured were from Mexico; the victims who were identified were from Mexico and Honduras.
The suspected driver of the pickup, 25-year old Santos Guajardo, died on Feb. 8 at the Nueces County Jail; he apparently hanged himself. He was scheduled for a federal court hearing the next day to face charges of transporting undocumented immigrants. (AP, Jan. 27, Feb. 9)
A woman from Jiutepec, Mexico, was killed and four men were hospitalized with major injuries on Jan. 24 when a car carrying migrants crashed in southern California’s Anza-Borrego Desert. The driver, who was injured, fled a border checkpoint on the old S2 road after US Border Patrol agents asked to check the trunk. Three men and a woman were in the trunk; they were thrown from the vehicle when the driver tried to drive off the road and crashed into large rocks. (San Diego Union-Tribune, Jan. 26)
From Immigration News Briefs, Feb. 11
See our last post on the border crisis.
