Posted on 09/11/2005 7:15:35 AM PDT by Embraer2004
Child migrant smugglers escape charges
BY ROSA MARÍA MÉNDEZ/EL UNIVERSAL September 11, 2005
MEXICALI, Baja California "El Coco," as he is known, is seventeen years old and is already an experienced migrant smuggler.
"I started in this work four years ago, helping out my stepfather," he said. "Just errands, really. I took the migrants who were already in Calexico (California) to Los Angeles. But then I started bringing the pollos (migrants) across the border, and now I'm in the big leagues."
Still, by his own account, this big leaguer has been caught by the Border Patrol smuggling migrants on 25 different occasions. And each time, due to his age, he was simply repatriated across the border to Mexico, where he immediately returned to the activity.
GROWING PRACTICE According to authorities in Mexicali and Calexico, more and more minors like "El Coco" are being recruited into the migrant smuggling business, since, unlike adults, they cannot be tried in California courts. Their only punishment is a return trip across the border.
So far in 2005, more than 800 minors have been deported from the United States across the CalexioMexicali stretch of border, said the Mexican consul in Calexico, Pablo Arnaud Carreño. Of those, 150 have tried to enter the United States illegally on more than 20 occasions, and at least ten percent of those, said the consul, were working as migrant smugglers.
"We calculate that there are 150 youths along this stretch of border who are working for sophisticated human trafficking bands," said Arnaud Carreño.
Miguel Ángel Hernández, a spokesman for the Border Patrol, said that the deportation of minors has increased markedly in recent years. And he expressed frustration at the inability to confront the phenomenon.
"All of the minors that we detain even those we know were working as polleros (smugglers) are brought to the Mexican Consulate for voluntary repatriation," he said. "They are taking advantage of the laws in this county that say that we can't try them as adults."
The Mexicali director of public security, Javier Salas Espinosa, said that due to the legal provisions in California, minors are being recruited by adults to participate not just in human smuggling, but in drug trafficking and moving stolen goods across the border as well.
And like many city officials, he points to Mexicali's Robledo neighborhood as a hot spot for this type of activity.
Founded in 1981 by squatters on the fringes of the city, Robledo has remained a poverty-stricken area where crimes of all types have flourished. It is here that gangs like the Huevones and the Chacales have formed, largely to exploit the crossborder movement of people and drugs. And now these gangs have a junior partner, the "Chiquipollos:" an organized band of underage smugglers.
"In the various operatives that we have carried out in this neighborhood, we have learned that there are some 150 minors, most of them children of gang members, working as smugglers," said Police Chief Javier Salas Espinoza.
Most of the youths involved in smuggling are between the ages of 13 and 18, said Salas Espinoza, although some are as young as eight or nine.
GANG TURF Salas Espinoza said that there are five areas of Robledo that are so dangerous and so well-protected that not even the police can penetrate them. The 100 or so houses in these areas are used for hiding migrants before a crossing, or for concealing drugs and stolen goods before they are shipped north.
And so with police in Mexicali unable to stop the illegal activities at their points of origins on the Mexican side, and with the justice system in California ill-equipped to deal with Mexican minors caught in illegal acts, youths will continue to be used to ferry migrants across the border at Calexico.
And that suits El Coco just fine. He takes in as much as US3,000 per week as a smuggler, he said. Plus, he takes satisfaction from a job well done.
"The truth is that (we minors) are so good at this and so friendly with the people that they even tip us on occasion," he said proudly.
Then we erase the border?
As devastating as Katrina was/is, illegals should be #1 on Bush's and the nation's To Do List. It's getting worse each and every day. LA didn't want the US National Guard because of what it would look like, but then we turn around and welcome with open arms the Mexican Army into Texas (hmm, did they leave?). Mindboggling.
I blame your hero George Bush for this sorry state of affairs. And I voted twice for him
This article is from some cockamamie Spanish fish wrap. It's probably inaccurate as to what courts these juvenile people-smugglers would get tried in. They should be tried in Federal court. Entering the USA after deportation is a felony. Nail these punks
Don't wait too long for a response from swampy. His account has been suspended. He'll be back soon enough, though.
Thanks .... bayou is banned for a while.
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