Brownsville Herald
August 8, 2010
by Emma Perez-Trevino
While water seeps quietly under the foundation of the two dams in the vast water-management system along the Rio Grande, a whistle-blowing lawyer says he has important information that he hopes will filter to the surface before tragedy occurs.
The dam and levee system provides water for more than 3 million people who live along the Rio Grande.
The two dams – Amistad in Val Verde County and Falcon in Zapata County – are operated by the International Boundary and Water Commission, a U.S.-Mexican agency charged with handling issues concerning bodies of water, sanitation, water quality and flood control along the border.
Robert McCarthy, a self-described whistleblower from El Paso who was employed as general counsel for the U.S. section of the IBWC, says he was fired shortly after he made allegations of fraud, waste, abuse and suspected criminal activity within the agency. A judge has backed the firing but McCarthy has appealed the decision and says he is hoping his termination will be declared improper.
In an interview last week with The Brownsville Herald, McCarthy said abuses within the IBWC have compromised operations, including the safety of the dams and the levee system along the Rio Grande.
In the summary of his appeal, McCarthy states: “The agency operates several international wastewater treatment plants, international dams, and other flood-control facilities, all of which are put at greater risk by this tiny cabal (of some employees at IBWC in 2009) that sees no further than their own parochial bureaucratic interests, jeopardizing the health and safety of millions of border residents.”
Representatives of the IBWC have denied wrongdoing and say the agency continues to properly do its work in managing the dams and levees.
THE ALLEGATIONS
McCarthy’s list of complaints about some of the processes within IBWC in 2009 includes claims that certain employees:
* Solicited bids and issued a contract to construct levees with funds received from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 with architectural designs for which the agency had no contractual rights and which cited state rather than required federal rules and standards. IBWC received $220 million in Recovery Act funds for rehabilitating levees and for flood-control projects.
* Conspired to conceal mismanagement of the $220 million flood-control project funded under the Recovery Act, making false and fraudulent reports to the U.S. Department of State.
* Illegally subsidized a border barrier in Hidalgo County for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security with Recovery Act funds intended solely for flood control.
* Chose to build a “cosmetic” levee with $37 million of emergency flood-control funds in Presidio to give the appearance of safety while covering up geophysical reports that the new levee would not withstand another flood.
* Issued an $88 million contract for an expansion of the South Bay International Wastewater Treatment Plant in San Diego, Calif., months before Congress appropriated the funds, then knowingly covered up the violation;
“While senior agency officials help themselves to illegal pay raises, spy on their colleagues with remote surveillance equipment, and routinely abuse agency staff, levees crumble, millions of dollars are siphoned off for projects unrelated to the agency’s mission, and millions of border residents are put at ever-greater risk of catastrophic injury to their health and safety,” according to McCarthy’s appeal.
He also maintains that the agency has downplayed deficiencies at Amistad Dam near Del Rio and Falcon Dam near Roma, saying an inspection in 2007 conducted by the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers and technical advisers to IBWC found that the entire foundation of Amistad Dam needs evaluation due to the potential impact of seepage from naturally occurring sinkholes.
The reports show that inspectors also noted that Falcon Dam’s entire foundation was in need of further assessment, citing a problem with seepage.
“It’s hard to see what, if anything, has been done since then,” McCarthy told the Herald Thursday.
RUTH RESPONDS
McCarthy’s allegations predate the administration of present IBWC Commissioner Edward Drusina, who was appointed in January by President Barack Obama.
McCarthy is appealing his firing by the former IBWC commissioner, La Feria native C. W. “Bill” Ruth.
McCarthy says Ruth fired him on July 31, 2009, three days after he reported his allegations to an array of federal agencies, including the White House. McCarthy had been with the agency just six months. Previously, he had served as a supervisory attorney with the U.S. Department of the Interior from 1999 to 2008.
Ruth declined to comment on McCarthy’s termination but did address the issue of sinkholes at Amistad Dam and said studies are under way.
“We have been working on that problem and we’ve been with our technical advisers, the Corps of Engineers and the Bureau of Reclamation, and Mexico, and the preliminary report has been made,” he said.
Ruth is referring to a report that a panel of technical advisers issued in November 2009 regarding the condition of Amistad Dam and a plan of action.
“The judgment is that we needed to go forward and do additional studies and that is in progress at Amistad, and we were supposed to have gotten started looking at Falcon Dam this year.
“The judgment was that there was no immediate danger and that the dams had been maintained properly and were in a good state of repair, but that these other problems should be looked at, and they are,” Ruth said.
He said they are monitoring Amistad very closely “to make sure that there isn’t any increase in that flow or that there is no change in the flow being monitored coming from under the foundation.”
“You know, every dam leaks to some extent,” Ruth said. “I mean, that is just a natural occurrence. You will never be able to, in my opinion, completely shut it off. But I mean, whatever needs to be done will be done.”
He said that the longevity of the dams proves that they are of sound structure.
“Most of the dam failures that take place take place when the dam is first put into service,” Ruth said. “If there is a problem developing, you need to address it and that is what we are trying to do now – to determine if there is a problem or not.”
The IBWC has refused to release a copy of the November 2009 report on Amistad Dam to The Brownsville Herald, despite a formal request under the Freedom of Information Act.
IBWC’s FOIA Officer Eric Meza on Thursday declined the request in writing, stating that the report on Amistad Dam is exempted from public disclosure because it falls in the category of “inter-agency or intra-agency memorandums or letters which would not be available by law to a party other than an agency in litigation with the agency.
“Such record is privileged as reflecting the deliberative process of government, in addition to containing the guidance of consultants acting in the interest of the agency,” he said, noting that the decision could be appealed.
McCARTHY’S SITUATION
Regarding his firing from the IBWC, McCarthy has filed a petition for review by the Merit Systems Protection Board.
Ruth, the man who fired him, declined to discuss the matter, citing ongoing litigation.
However, in the July 31, 2009, termination letter to McCarthy, obtained by the Herald, Ruth said McCarthy’s conduct had failed to demonstrate his fitness for continued employment. He writes that McCarthy had not supported him or the executive staff in a “constructive and collegial manner” in Ruth’s effort to bring unity within the executive staff.
McCarthy’s petition on his firing already has been heard by merit board Administrative Judge David A. Thayer.
IBWC spokeswoman Sally Spener said in a written statement Friday that Thayer on April 9 denied McCarthy’s request for corrective action.
“Judge Thayer found clear and convincing evidence that the agency would have terminated Mr. McCarthy’s employment regardless of his alleged whistleblower disclosures,” Spener said. “Judge Thayer found that Mr. McCarthy’s employment was terminated after he prepared and distributed numerous factually and legally erroneous memoranda.”
Spener also noted that levee rehabilitation projects in Hidalgo County have been designed to meet federal criteria for the 100-year flood and that all construction contracts issued have been in accordance with federal contracting rules and standards.
In a letter she sent to McCarthy’s lawyers last August, Spener described the agency as one that had undergone a significant and positive transformation. Earlier, in 2005, the U.S. Department of State’s Office of the Inspector General had issued a scathing report that found the agency under then-Commissioner Arturo Duran to be grossly mismanaged and lacking oversight.
McCarthy believes there can be no changes within IBWC until it comes under the oversight of a larger agency, such as the Department of State, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers or the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.
In October 2006, the Department of State’s Office of Inspector General wrote that the IBWC “is simply too small, too isolated, and too vulnerable to management abuse to continue without the protection and oversight of a major government department.”
“The Department (of State) was asked in early 2005 to provide its own solution to the oversight problem and could not do so,” the OIG report further noted.
http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/news/water-115220-grande-dams.html
Sunday, August 8, 2010
GOP: Border security remains issue despite statistics
Brownsville Herald
August 8, 2010
by Jazmine Ulloa
An independent study that found that deportations of illegal immigrants have increased under President Barack Obama drew fire from Texas Republicans who said the figures skirt Obama’s inadequate response to the issue of border security.
The report released last week by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University said that 279,035 undocumented immigrants had been deported in the first nine months of this fiscal year — a 10 percent increase compared to the 254,763 deportations in the same time frame in 2008, the last and busiest year of President George W. Bush’s administration.
The findings come amid a tense political debate that has pitted comprehensive immigration reform against questions about whether the Obama administration has done enough to secure the nation’s borders.
Supporters of immigration reform have said the nation is in a period of enforcement, in which not only deportations but also immigration prosecutions continue at high levels, similar to the situation under Bush.
Studies show Obama continues to pour billions of dollars into the Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Some immigration attorneys say he has stepped up the criminalization of immigrants so much that they have given the system a new name — “crimmigration.”
The TRAC study states that the deportation figures undermine blasts from GOP leaders that Obama has failed to secure the U.S.-Mexico border.
But Texas Republican leaders said that although Obama might be targeting noncitizens inside the country, he is not placing enough focus on tightening the border to keep undocumented immigrants from entering in the first place.
“While we are pleased these actions are increasing, you cannot secure the border with investigations and prosecutions alone,” said Katherine Cesinger, deputy press secretary for the Office of Gov. Rick Perry. “The governor has continually urged the Obama administration to increase the number of law enforcement personnel patrolling the Texas-Mexico border. Without adequate manpower available to patrol the border, it will continue to be exploited by drug and human traffickers.”
How to secure the border?
Border security came to the forefront of the immigration debate when an Arizona rancher was killed allegedly by drug smugglers, leading eventually to a new Arizona law that has incited national controversy because it requires local, county and state law enforcement officers to enforce immigration law.
But surging violence in Mexico has kept border security at the center of the debate, often displacing comprehensive immigration reform. Gov. Rick Perry on a recent trip to Brownsville was clear about his position — border security first, immigration reform second.
“The whole issue of immigration reform is a waste of time until you focus on the issue of border security,” Perry said. And for most Republican leaders, the issue appears to be about more resources, more technology and more boots on the ground along the border.
President Obama announced in May that he would deploy 1,200 National Guardsmen to the Southwest border and request $500 million for border protection and law enforcement activities to combat illegal activity. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the Defense Department announced last month that more than 250 of those troops would begin arriving in Texas this month.
But in Brownsville, Perry said he did not think Obama was sending enough troops to the state, which he said needed at least 3,000 — not the mere 286 it has been allocated.
“It is a first step. I will be blunt — it is a baby step,” he said of the deployment.
In a op-ed article in the Austin-American Statesman, U.S. Rep Henry McCaul (R-Austin) and U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Laredo) call for a “layered strategy” to patrol the Texas-Mexico border. The congressmen push for the use of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), which use cameras, radar systems and other sensors to provide real-time intelligence to the Border Patrol.
In a statement, McCaul said the increased number of deportations was not enough.
“The fact remains that until we commit to a comprehensive strategy to secure our borders and aggressively address illegal immigration, we will continue to see an influx of illegal crossings,” he said.
Frank Morris, chairman of the Cameron County Republicans of Texas, said he has not seen enough commitment by the current administration to border enforcement projects, such as the U.S.-Mexico border fence.
“The fence became so controversial in the media that other means to secure our border had to be utilized instead of completing the fence,” Morris said. “You can’t do these things half-heartedly and say they’re not working. The fence is not working – of course it is not working, it hasn’t been completed.”
Immigration advocates and attorneys counter that the emphasis on border security is part of the GOP’s strategy to obstruct immigration reform, leaving millions of undocumented immigrants to live in the shadows.
Javier Maldonado, in immigration attorney in San Antonio, said the United States has been focusing on border security since 9/11.
“Everything has been about securing the border, from tightening our financial laws, tightening national security laws, to increasing the personnel on the border,” he said. “We need a balance.”
http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/news/obama-115219-remains-increased.html
August 8, 2010
by Jazmine Ulloa
An independent study that found that deportations of illegal immigrants have increased under President Barack Obama drew fire from Texas Republicans who said the figures skirt Obama’s inadequate response to the issue of border security.
The report released last week by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University said that 279,035 undocumented immigrants had been deported in the first nine months of this fiscal year — a 10 percent increase compared to the 254,763 deportations in the same time frame in 2008, the last and busiest year of President George W. Bush’s administration.
The findings come amid a tense political debate that has pitted comprehensive immigration reform against questions about whether the Obama administration has done enough to secure the nation’s borders.
Supporters of immigration reform have said the nation is in a period of enforcement, in which not only deportations but also immigration prosecutions continue at high levels, similar to the situation under Bush.
Studies show Obama continues to pour billions of dollars into the Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Some immigration attorneys say he has stepped up the criminalization of immigrants so much that they have given the system a new name — “crimmigration.”
The TRAC study states that the deportation figures undermine blasts from GOP leaders that Obama has failed to secure the U.S.-Mexico border.
But Texas Republican leaders said that although Obama might be targeting noncitizens inside the country, he is not placing enough focus on tightening the border to keep undocumented immigrants from entering in the first place.
“While we are pleased these actions are increasing, you cannot secure the border with investigations and prosecutions alone,” said Katherine Cesinger, deputy press secretary for the Office of Gov. Rick Perry. “The governor has continually urged the Obama administration to increase the number of law enforcement personnel patrolling the Texas-Mexico border. Without adequate manpower available to patrol the border, it will continue to be exploited by drug and human traffickers.”
How to secure the border?
Border security came to the forefront of the immigration debate when an Arizona rancher was killed allegedly by drug smugglers, leading eventually to a new Arizona law that has incited national controversy because it requires local, county and state law enforcement officers to enforce immigration law.
But surging violence in Mexico has kept border security at the center of the debate, often displacing comprehensive immigration reform. Gov. Rick Perry on a recent trip to Brownsville was clear about his position — border security first, immigration reform second.
“The whole issue of immigration reform is a waste of time until you focus on the issue of border security,” Perry said. And for most Republican leaders, the issue appears to be about more resources, more technology and more boots on the ground along the border.
President Obama announced in May that he would deploy 1,200 National Guardsmen to the Southwest border and request $500 million for border protection and law enforcement activities to combat illegal activity. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the Defense Department announced last month that more than 250 of those troops would begin arriving in Texas this month.
But in Brownsville, Perry said he did not think Obama was sending enough troops to the state, which he said needed at least 3,000 — not the mere 286 it has been allocated.
“It is a first step. I will be blunt — it is a baby step,” he said of the deployment.
In a op-ed article in the Austin-American Statesman, U.S. Rep Henry McCaul (R-Austin) and U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Laredo) call for a “layered strategy” to patrol the Texas-Mexico border. The congressmen push for the use of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), which use cameras, radar systems and other sensors to provide real-time intelligence to the Border Patrol.
In a statement, McCaul said the increased number of deportations was not enough.
“The fact remains that until we commit to a comprehensive strategy to secure our borders and aggressively address illegal immigration, we will continue to see an influx of illegal crossings,” he said.
Frank Morris, chairman of the Cameron County Republicans of Texas, said he has not seen enough commitment by the current administration to border enforcement projects, such as the U.S.-Mexico border fence.
“The fence became so controversial in the media that other means to secure our border had to be utilized instead of completing the fence,” Morris said. “You can’t do these things half-heartedly and say they’re not working. The fence is not working – of course it is not working, it hasn’t been completed.”
Immigration advocates and attorneys counter that the emphasis on border security is part of the GOP’s strategy to obstruct immigration reform, leaving millions of undocumented immigrants to live in the shadows.
Javier Maldonado, in immigration attorney in San Antonio, said the United States has been focusing on border security since 9/11.
“Everything has been about securing the border, from tightening our financial laws, tightening national security laws, to increasing the personnel on the border,” he said. “We need a balance.”
http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/news/obama-115219-remains-increased.html
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
July proved deadly month for migrants
Arizona Daily Star
August 3, 2010
by Brady McCombs
July was the second-deadliest month on record for illegal immigrants crossing in Southern Arizona, with 59 bodies ending up at the Pima County Medical Examiner's Office.
The month's total ranks second only to the 69 deaths recorded by the office in July 2005.
The death toll began early in the month and continued at such a fast pace the office had to bring in additional storage space to house the bodies.
• On July 2, the office handled the bodies of five illegal immigrants who died in Arizona's desert.
• Thirteen more bodies came in over the next eight days. Then, six July 11 and four more bodies a day later.
• July 15 was the worst day, with seven bodies: five men and two women.
The deadly month brings the calendar year-to-date total through July for the Pima County Medical Examiner's Office to 153, ahead of the past two years at the same time and only slightly behind the 159 handled through the same date in the 2007, a record-breaking year.
"I hope that people - no matter which side of the immigration debate they are on - agree that individuals dying in our community is an absolute tragedy and that something needs to be done about," said Kat Rodriguez of Coalición de Derechos Humanos.
The Medical Examiner's Office has handled the bodies of more than 1,650 illegal border crossers found since 2001 on the Tohono O'odham Nation, and in Pima, Santa Cruz and Pinal counties.
The Cochise County Medical Examiner's Office reported two bodies in July, bringing its yearly total to 19, compared with 21 at the same time last year.
More than two-thirds of the dead illegal immigrants who ended up at the Pima County office this past month had died recently, said Dr. Bruce Parks, chief medical examiner. All but nine were men, and 46 of the 59 remained unidentified.
The busy month filled the medical examiner's two refrigerated storage spaces, prompting officials to put a 55-foot refrigerated trailer in service to house additional bodies, Parks said.
It's difficult to track exactly how much taxpayer money is spent handling the illegal border crossers because the 27 employees fit the recoveries, autopsies and investigations in with the rest of their work. One way to estimate is by multiplying the average cost of an autopsy, about $2,000, times the number of bodies, which this year would total $306,000.
It's unclear exactly why this July was so deadly, but heat obviously was a factor: At least 32 of the 59 people died from hyperthermia or exposure to the heat, medical examiner records show. Most of the other causes of death are pending or undetermined.
In terms of the average temperature recorded at Tucson International Airport, July was the seventh-warmest on record for the metro area, said meteorologist John Glueck of the National Weather Service. The month also had 18 days of 100 degrees or higher temperatures in Tucson, with the highs in the desert usually much hotter than the recorded highs in Tucson.
The increase in deaths doesn't track with the Border Patrol's apprehensions, which are down for the sixth straight year. Agents in the Tucson Sector made 184,000 apprehensions from Oct. 1 through June 30, compared with 185,500 at the same time last fiscal year, said Border Patrol spokesman Omar Candelaria. The agency didn't have figures through July available yet.
The Border Patrol believes these numbers show fewer people are crossing, Candelaria said. With 3,200 permanent agents and 400 more here temporarily from other sectors, the agency has more areas under control than before, he said.
Many experts believe the massive buildup of agents, fences and technology along Arizona's stretch of U.S.-Mexico border has forced illegal immigrants into walking longer distances in more treacherous terrain.
"People are being pushed into more and more isolated areas," Rodriguez said.
Candelaria agrees that illegal immigrants are crossing in more remote areas because of the increased presence. "The smugglers are trying to find the places where we are not at," he said.
But the blame should be on the smugglers, not the Border Patrol, he said.
"To lay the blame on the Border Patrol for this is just not right," Candelaria said. "What we are doing is to protect the nation. The smugglers are the ones taking them to these far-out areas and not preparing them."
The Border Patrol - with 48 agents assigned to its search, trauma and rescue team and 200 others who are trained EMTs - has rescued 390 illegal border crossers in the Tucson Sector from Oct. 1 to June 30. That's up from the 300 rescued through the same time period the year before.
With one of the hottest months over and rain more frequent, the Pima County Medical Examiner's Office hopes the death toll will slow, although there have already been two bodies brought in during the first two days of August.
"It will slow down," Parks said. "I can't imagine it getting any worse."
On StarNet: Search an online database of people who have died attempting to cross the U.S.-Mexico border, at go.azstarnet.com/borderdeaths
http://azstarnet.com/news/local/border/article_e2da2bc8-9e08-55a5-bce6-bd16db7f3599.html
August 3, 2010
by Brady McCombs
July was the second-deadliest month on record for illegal immigrants crossing in Southern Arizona, with 59 bodies ending up at the Pima County Medical Examiner's Office.
The month's total ranks second only to the 69 deaths recorded by the office in July 2005.
The death toll began early in the month and continued at such a fast pace the office had to bring in additional storage space to house the bodies.
• On July 2, the office handled the bodies of five illegal immigrants who died in Arizona's desert.
• Thirteen more bodies came in over the next eight days. Then, six July 11 and four more bodies a day later.
• July 15 was the worst day, with seven bodies: five men and two women.
The deadly month brings the calendar year-to-date total through July for the Pima County Medical Examiner's Office to 153, ahead of the past two years at the same time and only slightly behind the 159 handled through the same date in the 2007, a record-breaking year.
"I hope that people - no matter which side of the immigration debate they are on - agree that individuals dying in our community is an absolute tragedy and that something needs to be done about," said Kat Rodriguez of Coalición de Derechos Humanos.
The Medical Examiner's Office has handled the bodies of more than 1,650 illegal border crossers found since 2001 on the Tohono O'odham Nation, and in Pima, Santa Cruz and Pinal counties.
The Cochise County Medical Examiner's Office reported two bodies in July, bringing its yearly total to 19, compared with 21 at the same time last year.
More than two-thirds of the dead illegal immigrants who ended up at the Pima County office this past month had died recently, said Dr. Bruce Parks, chief medical examiner. All but nine were men, and 46 of the 59 remained unidentified.
The busy month filled the medical examiner's two refrigerated storage spaces, prompting officials to put a 55-foot refrigerated trailer in service to house additional bodies, Parks said.
It's difficult to track exactly how much taxpayer money is spent handling the illegal border crossers because the 27 employees fit the recoveries, autopsies and investigations in with the rest of their work. One way to estimate is by multiplying the average cost of an autopsy, about $2,000, times the number of bodies, which this year would total $306,000.
It's unclear exactly why this July was so deadly, but heat obviously was a factor: At least 32 of the 59 people died from hyperthermia or exposure to the heat, medical examiner records show. Most of the other causes of death are pending or undetermined.
In terms of the average temperature recorded at Tucson International Airport, July was the seventh-warmest on record for the metro area, said meteorologist John Glueck of the National Weather Service. The month also had 18 days of 100 degrees or higher temperatures in Tucson, with the highs in the desert usually much hotter than the recorded highs in Tucson.
The increase in deaths doesn't track with the Border Patrol's apprehensions, which are down for the sixth straight year. Agents in the Tucson Sector made 184,000 apprehensions from Oct. 1 through June 30, compared with 185,500 at the same time last fiscal year, said Border Patrol spokesman Omar Candelaria. The agency didn't have figures through July available yet.
The Border Patrol believes these numbers show fewer people are crossing, Candelaria said. With 3,200 permanent agents and 400 more here temporarily from other sectors, the agency has more areas under control than before, he said.
Many experts believe the massive buildup of agents, fences and technology along Arizona's stretch of U.S.-Mexico border has forced illegal immigrants into walking longer distances in more treacherous terrain.
"People are being pushed into more and more isolated areas," Rodriguez said.
Candelaria agrees that illegal immigrants are crossing in more remote areas because of the increased presence. "The smugglers are trying to find the places where we are not at," he said.
But the blame should be on the smugglers, not the Border Patrol, he said.
"To lay the blame on the Border Patrol for this is just not right," Candelaria said. "What we are doing is to protect the nation. The smugglers are the ones taking them to these far-out areas and not preparing them."
The Border Patrol - with 48 agents assigned to its search, trauma and rescue team and 200 others who are trained EMTs - has rescued 390 illegal border crossers in the Tucson Sector from Oct. 1 to June 30. That's up from the 300 rescued through the same time period the year before.
With one of the hottest months over and rain more frequent, the Pima County Medical Examiner's Office hopes the death toll will slow, although there have already been two bodies brought in during the first two days of August.
"It will slow down," Parks said. "I can't imagine it getting any worse."
On StarNet: Search an online database of people who have died attempting to cross the U.S.-Mexico border, at go.azstarnet.com/borderdeaths
http://azstarnet.com/news/local/border/article_e2da2bc8-9e08-55a5-bce6-bd16db7f3599.html
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
El Paso murders, crime rate overall fall
El Paso Times
August 3, 2010
by Daniel Borunda
EL PASO -- About 1,700 homicides have occurred in Juárez this year. El Paso has had one.
Despite the rampant bloodshed in Mexico, the overall crime rate in El Paso has decreased slightly this year.
The drop in murders comes as the El Paso City Council mulls raising taxes or furloughing police officers. Neighborhood Watch groups this evening will get together for block parties as part of the anti-crime National Night Out.
Police officials said crime is down 1 percent citywide with decreases in the number of murders, burglaries, auto thefts and vehicle break-ins. Assaults are up 4 percent and robberies have remained the same.
One homicide this year is unusual even for a city that normally has few slayings. El Paso, estimated population of 751,000, had seven homicides at this time last year. The year ended with 13 homicides.
"It almost defies explanation," said Jack Levin, one of the nation's best known criminologists. "I can't think of another city in the U.S., another large city, that has only had one homicide. It's absolutely outstanding."
Homicides in recent years have been declining nationally with the aging of the baby boomer generation, said Levin, a professor at Northeastern University in Boston.
Levin, in a telephone interview, said cities with large Latino immigrant populations, such as El Paso, San Diego and San Jose, Calif., tend to have low crime rates.
"Immigrants -- whether from Mexico, Italy, or Poland -- have often left family and friends to have a new life and begin anew," Levin said. "They are very success oriented, middle class. They simply have a very low crime rate."
But Levin said that while the immigrant factor helps explain El Paso's low crime numbers, it doesn't explain why murders would plummet one year to the next.
"I've actually said to the reporters in other cities, 'If you want to be safe from murder, move to El Paso,' " Levin said.
However, Levin cautioned, killings tend to occur in clusters and the rest of the year could be different.
Detective Mike Baranyay, an El Paso police spokesman, said the credit for the drop in crime goes to police working with residents who are willing to report suspicious activity.
"The community, I believe, is really taking an active role in keeping their community safe," Baranyay said.
Tina Gianes, president of the Neighborhood Watch Association of El Paso, said most of the complaints she hears are about cars speeding on residential streets or shady door-to-door salesmen.
Gianes said one of the reasons El Paso has a reputation as a safe city is because crime is kept from escalating because residents will report suspicious activity.
"I think more people are getting involved. They are not afraid to speakup," she said.
The contrast is Juárez. The city of 1.3 million has been described as the murder capital of Mexico and one of the most dangerous cities in the world. A two-year war between the Sinaloa and Juárez drug cartels has escalated to the use of car bombs, explosives and frequent attacks on police.
Levin said the drug violence in Mexico has its roots in extreme poverty, powerful organized crime gangs and a "tremendous amount of corruption."
The violence in Juárez is the backdrop as the city of El Paso struggles with its budget and a contract dispute with the police union that could lead to higher property taxes, the canceling of a police academy class or furloughs for police officers.
The El Paso police union last week voted against reopening contract negotiations.
The city wanted to delay a 2 percent cost of living raise that is due Sept. 1. The city has made $3.5 million in cuts to its budget and is looking to cut $1 million more.
A crime is committed in El Paso every 16.1 minutes, according to a "crime clock" in the police budget presentation using data from last year. A murder occurred every 28 days.
Ron Martin, president of the El Paso Municipal Police Officers Association, said taking officers off the street will affect services.
"If you are already stretched thin, how are you going to furlough officers and not affect response times?" Martin said.
Some members of the City Council have argued that further budget cuts to other public services are not feasible.
"City Council can say whatever they want," Martin said. "They are not the ones who reduce crime. It is the police officers. Crime has been reduced because officers are out there every day."
Levin, the criminologist, said other cities face the same dilemma.
"El Paso may save money by reducing the size of the police force, perhaps reducing programs for children, but in the long term it will be very costly," Levin said.
"Part of the reason the crime rate is low is El Paso has been willing to spend the money to keep youngsters busy and supervised and keeping police on the streets," Levin said. "You can pay now or you can pay later. But one way or another, you pay."
http://www.elpasotimes.com/news/ci_15663742?source=email
August 3, 2010
by Daniel Borunda
EL PASO -- About 1,700 homicides have occurred in Juárez this year. El Paso has had one.
Despite the rampant bloodshed in Mexico, the overall crime rate in El Paso has decreased slightly this year.
The drop in murders comes as the El Paso City Council mulls raising taxes or furloughing police officers. Neighborhood Watch groups this evening will get together for block parties as part of the anti-crime National Night Out.
Police officials said crime is down 1 percent citywide with decreases in the number of murders, burglaries, auto thefts and vehicle break-ins. Assaults are up 4 percent and robberies have remained the same.
One homicide this year is unusual even for a city that normally has few slayings. El Paso, estimated population of 751,000, had seven homicides at this time last year. The year ended with 13 homicides.
"It almost defies explanation," said Jack Levin, one of the nation's best known criminologists. "I can't think of another city in the U.S., another large city, that has only had one homicide. It's absolutely outstanding."
Homicides in recent years have been declining nationally with the aging of the baby boomer generation, said Levin, a professor at Northeastern University in Boston.
Levin, in a telephone interview, said cities with large Latino immigrant populations, such as El Paso, San Diego and San Jose, Calif., tend to have low crime rates.
"Immigrants -- whether from Mexico, Italy, or Poland -- have often left family and friends to have a new life and begin anew," Levin said. "They are very success oriented, middle class. They simply have a very low crime rate."
But Levin said that while the immigrant factor helps explain El Paso's low crime numbers, it doesn't explain why murders would plummet one year to the next.
"I've actually said to the reporters in other cities, 'If you want to be safe from murder, move to El Paso,' " Levin said.
However, Levin cautioned, killings tend to occur in clusters and the rest of the year could be different.
Detective Mike Baranyay, an El Paso police spokesman, said the credit for the drop in crime goes to police working with residents who are willing to report suspicious activity.
"The community, I believe, is really taking an active role in keeping their community safe," Baranyay said.
Tina Gianes, president of the Neighborhood Watch Association of El Paso, said most of the complaints she hears are about cars speeding on residential streets or shady door-to-door salesmen.
Gianes said one of the reasons El Paso has a reputation as a safe city is because crime is kept from escalating because residents will report suspicious activity.
"I think more people are getting involved. They are not afraid to speakup," she said.
The contrast is Juárez. The city of 1.3 million has been described as the murder capital of Mexico and one of the most dangerous cities in the world. A two-year war between the Sinaloa and Juárez drug cartels has escalated to the use of car bombs, explosives and frequent attacks on police.
Levin said the drug violence in Mexico has its roots in extreme poverty, powerful organized crime gangs and a "tremendous amount of corruption."
The violence in Juárez is the backdrop as the city of El Paso struggles with its budget and a contract dispute with the police union that could lead to higher property taxes, the canceling of a police academy class or furloughs for police officers.
The El Paso police union last week voted against reopening contract negotiations.
The city wanted to delay a 2 percent cost of living raise that is due Sept. 1. The city has made $3.5 million in cuts to its budget and is looking to cut $1 million more.
A crime is committed in El Paso every 16.1 minutes, according to a "crime clock" in the police budget presentation using data from last year. A murder occurred every 28 days.
Ron Martin, president of the El Paso Municipal Police Officers Association, said taking officers off the street will affect services.
"If you are already stretched thin, how are you going to furlough officers and not affect response times?" Martin said.
Some members of the City Council have argued that further budget cuts to other public services are not feasible.
"City Council can say whatever they want," Martin said. "They are not the ones who reduce crime. It is the police officers. Crime has been reduced because officers are out there every day."
Levin, the criminologist, said other cities face the same dilemma.
"El Paso may save money by reducing the size of the police force, perhaps reducing programs for children, but in the long term it will be very costly," Levin said.
"Part of the reason the crime rate is low is El Paso has been willing to spend the money to keep youngsters busy and supervised and keeping police on the streets," Levin said. "You can pay now or you can pay later. But one way or another, you pay."
http://www.elpasotimes.com/news/ci_15663742?source=email
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Support for Mexican Border Fence Up to 68%
Rasmussen Reports
July 29, 2010
Support for the building of a fence along the Mexican border has reached a new high, and voters are more confident than ever that illegal immigration can be stopped.
A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 68% of U.S. voters now believe the United States should continue to build a fence on the Mexican border. That’s up nine points from March when the Obama administration halted funding for the fence and the highest level of support ever.
Just 21% oppose the continued building of the border fence.
Support for the fence is strong across all demographic groups. But while 76% of Mainstream voters think the United States should continue to build the fence, 67% of the Political Class are opposed to it.
Forty-seven percent (47%) of all voters believe it is possible to end illegal immigration. That’s up slightly from April of last year.
Now only 36% do not think it is possible for the United States to prevent illegal immigrants from getting into the country. That’s down sixteen points since October 2008.
(Want a free daily e-mail update? If it's in the news, it's in our polls). Rasmussen Reports updates are also available on Twitter or Facebook.
The survey of 1,000 Likely U.S. Voters was conducted on July 24-25, 2010 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.
Illegal immigration, always a concern to many voters, has taken on increased visibility due to the controversy over Arizona’s new immigration law. The state law went into effect today, but a federal judge has put several of its more controversial provisions on hold until a Justice Department legal challenge of the law is resolved.
Fifty-six percent (56%) of voters nationwide oppose the Justice Department’s decision to challenge the Arizona law, and 61% favor passage of a law like Arizona’s in their own state.
Fifty-four percent (54%) say the Justice Department instead should take legal action against cities that provide sanctuary for illegal immigrants. Even more think the federal government should cut off funds to these “sanctuary cities.”
Most voters ages 40 and older say it is possible for the United States to end illegal immigration. Republicans by better than two-to-one are more confident than Democrats that it’s possible. Voters not affiliated with either party are more closely divided on the question.
Most members of the Political Class, however, say it can’t be done. Fifty-six percent (56%) of Mainstream voters say it is possible to stop illegal immigration, but 58% of the Political Class disagree.
Sixty-eight percent (68%) of voters say the Political Class doesn’t care what most Americans think anyway.
The number of voters who view the issue of immigration as Very Important has jumped 16 points from last month to its highest level ever, although it still ranks fifth on a list of 10 issues regularly tracked by Rasmussen Reports.
In December 2008, just after President-elect Obama put Janet Napolitano, an opponent of the border fence, in charge of immigration activities, 74% of voters said the federal government was not doing enough to stop illegal immigration.
Sixty-four percent (64%) of voters believe the federal government by failing to enforce immigration law is more to blame for the current controversy over Arizona’s new statute than state officials are for passing it.
In fact, by a two-to-one margin, voters believe the policies of the federal government encourage people to enter the United States illegally.
Voters also have said consistently for years that when it comes to immigration reform, gaining control of the border is more important than legalizing the status of undocumented workers already living in the United States.
Still, 58% favor a welcoming immigration policy that excludes only national security threats, criminals and those who come here to live off the U.S. welfare system.
Please sign up for the Rasmussen Reports daily e-mail update (it’s free) or follow us on Twitter or Facebook. Let us keep you up to date with the latest public opinion news.
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/current_events/immigration/support_for_mexican_border_fence_up_to_68
July 29, 2010
Support for the building of a fence along the Mexican border has reached a new high, and voters are more confident than ever that illegal immigration can be stopped.
A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 68% of U.S. voters now believe the United States should continue to build a fence on the Mexican border. That’s up nine points from March when the Obama administration halted funding for the fence and the highest level of support ever.
Just 21% oppose the continued building of the border fence.
Support for the fence is strong across all demographic groups. But while 76% of Mainstream voters think the United States should continue to build the fence, 67% of the Political Class are opposed to it.
Forty-seven percent (47%) of all voters believe it is possible to end illegal immigration. That’s up slightly from April of last year.
Now only 36% do not think it is possible for the United States to prevent illegal immigrants from getting into the country. That’s down sixteen points since October 2008.
(Want a free daily e-mail update? If it's in the news, it's in our polls). Rasmussen Reports updates are also available on Twitter or Facebook.
The survey of 1,000 Likely U.S. Voters was conducted on July 24-25, 2010 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.
Illegal immigration, always a concern to many voters, has taken on increased visibility due to the controversy over Arizona’s new immigration law. The state law went into effect today, but a federal judge has put several of its more controversial provisions on hold until a Justice Department legal challenge of the law is resolved.
Fifty-six percent (56%) of voters nationwide oppose the Justice Department’s decision to challenge the Arizona law, and 61% favor passage of a law like Arizona’s in their own state.
Fifty-four percent (54%) say the Justice Department instead should take legal action against cities that provide sanctuary for illegal immigrants. Even more think the federal government should cut off funds to these “sanctuary cities.”
Most voters ages 40 and older say it is possible for the United States to end illegal immigration. Republicans by better than two-to-one are more confident than Democrats that it’s possible. Voters not affiliated with either party are more closely divided on the question.
Most members of the Political Class, however, say it can’t be done. Fifty-six percent (56%) of Mainstream voters say it is possible to stop illegal immigration, but 58% of the Political Class disagree.
Sixty-eight percent (68%) of voters say the Political Class doesn’t care what most Americans think anyway.
The number of voters who view the issue of immigration as Very Important has jumped 16 points from last month to its highest level ever, although it still ranks fifth on a list of 10 issues regularly tracked by Rasmussen Reports.
In December 2008, just after President-elect Obama put Janet Napolitano, an opponent of the border fence, in charge of immigration activities, 74% of voters said the federal government was not doing enough to stop illegal immigration.
Sixty-four percent (64%) of voters believe the federal government by failing to enforce immigration law is more to blame for the current controversy over Arizona’s new statute than state officials are for passing it.
In fact, by a two-to-one margin, voters believe the policies of the federal government encourage people to enter the United States illegally.
Voters also have said consistently for years that when it comes to immigration reform, gaining control of the border is more important than legalizing the status of undocumented workers already living in the United States.
Still, 58% favor a welcoming immigration policy that excludes only national security threats, criminals and those who come here to live off the U.S. welfare system.
Please sign up for the Rasmussen Reports daily e-mail update (it’s free) or follow us on Twitter or Facebook. Let us keep you up to date with the latest public opinion news.
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/current_events/immigration/support_for_mexican_border_fence_up_to_68
Friday, July 30, 2010
An Arizona Morgue Grows Crowded
New York Times
July 28, 2010
by James C. McKinley
TUCSON — Dr. Bruce Parks unzips a white body bag on a steel gurney and gingerly lifts out a human skull and mandible, turning them over in his hands and examining the few teeth still in their sockets.
The body bag, coated with dust, also contains a broken pelvis, a femur and a few smaller bones found in the desert in June, along with a pair of white sneakers.
“These are people who are probably not going to be identified,” said Dr. Parks, the chief medical examiner for Pima County. There are eight other body bags crowded on the gurney.
The Pima County morgue is running out of space as the number of Latin American immigrants found dead in the deserts around Tucson has soared this year during a heat wave.
The rise in deaths comes as Arizona is embroiled in a bitter legal battle over a new law intended to discourage illegal immigrants from settling here by making it a state crime for them to live or seek work.
But the law has not kept the immigrants from trying to cross hundreds of miles of desert on foot in record-breaking heat. The bodies of 57 border crossers have been brought in during July so far, putting it on track to be the worst month for such deaths in the last five years.
Since the first of the year, more than 150 people suspected of being illegal immigrants have been found dead, well above the 107 discovered during the same period in each of the last two years. The sudden spike in deaths has overwhelmed investigators and pathologists at the Pima County Medical Examiner’s Office. Two weeks ago, Dr. Parks was forced to bring in a refrigerated truck to store the remains of two dozen people because the building’s two units were full.
“We can store about 200 full-sized individuals, but we have over 300 people here now, and most of those are border crossers,” Dr. Parks said. “We keep hoping we have seen the worst of this, of these migration deaths. Yet we still see a lot of remains.”
The increase in deaths has happened despite many signs that the number of immigrants crossing the border illegally has dropped in recent years. The number of people caught trying to sneak across the frontier without a visa has fallen in each of the last five years and stands at about half of the record 616,000 arrested in 2000.
Not only has the economic downturn in the United States eliminated many of the jobs that used to lure immigrants, human rights groups say, but also the federal government has stepped up efforts to stop the underground railroad of migrants, building mammoth fences in several border towns and flooding the region with hundreds of new Border Patrol agents equipped with high-tech surveillance tools.
These tougher enforcement measures have pushed smugglers and illegal immigrants to take their chances on isolated trails through the deserts and mountains of southern Arizona, where they must sometimes walk for three or four days before reaching a road.
“As we gain more control, the smugglers are taking people out to even more remote areas,” said Omar Candelaria, the special operations supervisor for the Border Patrol’s Tucson Sector. “They have further to walk and they are less prepared for the journey, and they don’t make it.”
Mr. Candelaria said the surge in discoveries of bodies this year might also owe something to increased patrols. He noted that some of the remains found this year belong to people who died in previous years. But Dr. Parks said that could not account for the entire increase this year. Indeed, the majority of bodies brought in during July, Dr. Parks said, were dead less than a week.
Human rights groups say it is the government’s sustained crackdown on human smuggling that has led to more deaths.
“The more that you militarize the border, the more you push the migrant flows into more isolated and desolate areas, and people hurt or injured are just left behind,” said Kat Rodriguez, a spokeswoman for the Coalición de Derechos Humanos in Tucson.
At the medical examiner’s office in Tucson, Dr. Park’s team of five investigators, six pathologists and one forensic anthropologist face an enormous backlog of more than 150 unidentified remains, with one case going back as far as 2003.
Every day, they labor to match remains with descriptions provided by people who have called their office to report a missing relative, or with reports collected by human rights groups and by Mexican authorities.
Since 2000, Dr. Park’s office has handled more than 1,700 border-crossing cases, and officials here have managed to confirm the identities of about 1,050 of the remains.
Investigators sift through the things the dead carried for clues — Mexican voter registration cards, telephone numbers scrawled on scraps of paper, jewelry, rosaries, family photographs. Often there is precious little to go on.
We had one gentleman who came in as bones, but around his wrist there was a bracelet from a Mexican Hospital that had his picture,” said David Valenzuela, one of the investigators.
If no documents are found, the task becomes harder. Many of the deceased immigrants were too poor to have visited doctors or dentists on a regular basis, so dental or medical records may not exist. Sometimes, a family photograph of the deceased smiling widely is all investigators have to document dental work.
On a recent morning, Bruce Anderson, the forensic anthropologist in the office, was examining the skeleton of an adolescent boy, whose age was somewhere between 14 and 17. His mummified remains were found on the Tohono O’odham Indian Reservation west of Tucson on July 15. The only lead to his identity was a missing front tooth and the neighboring teeth crowded together in the space.
Dr. Anderson called the Coalición de Derechos Humanos, who had a report of a 13-year-old who had been reported missing this year after crossing the border near Sonoyta, Mexico.
The charity immediately contacted the boy’s family to see if he had lost a permanent tooth. Dr. Anderson was still waiting for a reply.
The process takes time, and remains keep piling up. On Monday, Mr. Anderson faced a backlog of 14 new skeletons, in addition to the 40 active cases he is investigating, he said. “One person can’t keep up with this load,” he said.
The pathologists are also under strain. One day last week, Dr. Cynthia Porterfield did five autopsies, on remains of border crossers who died in the desert.
Dr. Porterfield was able to identify one: Jesse Palma Valenzuela, 30, who died on July 12. Three of his travel companions had tried to carry his body back to Mexico but became tired and abandoned him, wrapped in a blanket and positioned off the ground in a tree to keep animals from eating him. Then they crossed back into Mexico and notified the Border Patrol.
Agents discovered Mr. Valenzuela’s body on July 17, right where his friends said it would be, about two-and-a-half miles east of Lukeville, Ariz., not far from the border. Though decomposed, he was still recognizable.
“He’s got quite a few tattoos,” Dr. Porterfield said. “It is how the family ID’d him.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/29/us/29border.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1
July 28, 2010
by James C. McKinley
TUCSON — Dr. Bruce Parks unzips a white body bag on a steel gurney and gingerly lifts out a human skull and mandible, turning them over in his hands and examining the few teeth still in their sockets.
The body bag, coated with dust, also contains a broken pelvis, a femur and a few smaller bones found in the desert in June, along with a pair of white sneakers.
“These are people who are probably not going to be identified,” said Dr. Parks, the chief medical examiner for Pima County. There are eight other body bags crowded on the gurney.
The Pima County morgue is running out of space as the number of Latin American immigrants found dead in the deserts around Tucson has soared this year during a heat wave.
The rise in deaths comes as Arizona is embroiled in a bitter legal battle over a new law intended to discourage illegal immigrants from settling here by making it a state crime for them to live or seek work.
But the law has not kept the immigrants from trying to cross hundreds of miles of desert on foot in record-breaking heat. The bodies of 57 border crossers have been brought in during July so far, putting it on track to be the worst month for such deaths in the last five years.
Since the first of the year, more than 150 people suspected of being illegal immigrants have been found dead, well above the 107 discovered during the same period in each of the last two years. The sudden spike in deaths has overwhelmed investigators and pathologists at the Pima County Medical Examiner’s Office. Two weeks ago, Dr. Parks was forced to bring in a refrigerated truck to store the remains of two dozen people because the building’s two units were full.
“We can store about 200 full-sized individuals, but we have over 300 people here now, and most of those are border crossers,” Dr. Parks said. “We keep hoping we have seen the worst of this, of these migration deaths. Yet we still see a lot of remains.”
The increase in deaths has happened despite many signs that the number of immigrants crossing the border illegally has dropped in recent years. The number of people caught trying to sneak across the frontier without a visa has fallen in each of the last five years and stands at about half of the record 616,000 arrested in 2000.
Not only has the economic downturn in the United States eliminated many of the jobs that used to lure immigrants, human rights groups say, but also the federal government has stepped up efforts to stop the underground railroad of migrants, building mammoth fences in several border towns and flooding the region with hundreds of new Border Patrol agents equipped with high-tech surveillance tools.
These tougher enforcement measures have pushed smugglers and illegal immigrants to take their chances on isolated trails through the deserts and mountains of southern Arizona, where they must sometimes walk for three or four days before reaching a road.
“As we gain more control, the smugglers are taking people out to even more remote areas,” said Omar Candelaria, the special operations supervisor for the Border Patrol’s Tucson Sector. “They have further to walk and they are less prepared for the journey, and they don’t make it.”
Mr. Candelaria said the surge in discoveries of bodies this year might also owe something to increased patrols. He noted that some of the remains found this year belong to people who died in previous years. But Dr. Parks said that could not account for the entire increase this year. Indeed, the majority of bodies brought in during July, Dr. Parks said, were dead less than a week.
Human rights groups say it is the government’s sustained crackdown on human smuggling that has led to more deaths.
“The more that you militarize the border, the more you push the migrant flows into more isolated and desolate areas, and people hurt or injured are just left behind,” said Kat Rodriguez, a spokeswoman for the Coalición de Derechos Humanos in Tucson.
At the medical examiner’s office in Tucson, Dr. Park’s team of five investigators, six pathologists and one forensic anthropologist face an enormous backlog of more than 150 unidentified remains, with one case going back as far as 2003.
Every day, they labor to match remains with descriptions provided by people who have called their office to report a missing relative, or with reports collected by human rights groups and by Mexican authorities.
Since 2000, Dr. Park’s office has handled more than 1,700 border-crossing cases, and officials here have managed to confirm the identities of about 1,050 of the remains.
Investigators sift through the things the dead carried for clues — Mexican voter registration cards, telephone numbers scrawled on scraps of paper, jewelry, rosaries, family photographs. Often there is precious little to go on.
We had one gentleman who came in as bones, but around his wrist there was a bracelet from a Mexican Hospital that had his picture,” said David Valenzuela, one of the investigators.
If no documents are found, the task becomes harder. Many of the deceased immigrants were too poor to have visited doctors or dentists on a regular basis, so dental or medical records may not exist. Sometimes, a family photograph of the deceased smiling widely is all investigators have to document dental work.
On a recent morning, Bruce Anderson, the forensic anthropologist in the office, was examining the skeleton of an adolescent boy, whose age was somewhere between 14 and 17. His mummified remains were found on the Tohono O’odham Indian Reservation west of Tucson on July 15. The only lead to his identity was a missing front tooth and the neighboring teeth crowded together in the space.
Dr. Anderson called the Coalición de Derechos Humanos, who had a report of a 13-year-old who had been reported missing this year after crossing the border near Sonoyta, Mexico.
The charity immediately contacted the boy’s family to see if he had lost a permanent tooth. Dr. Anderson was still waiting for a reply.
The process takes time, and remains keep piling up. On Monday, Mr. Anderson faced a backlog of 14 new skeletons, in addition to the 40 active cases he is investigating, he said. “One person can’t keep up with this load,” he said.
The pathologists are also under strain. One day last week, Dr. Cynthia Porterfield did five autopsies, on remains of border crossers who died in the desert.
Dr. Porterfield was able to identify one: Jesse Palma Valenzuela, 30, who died on July 12. Three of his travel companions had tried to carry his body back to Mexico but became tired and abandoned him, wrapped in a blanket and positioned off the ground in a tree to keep animals from eating him. Then they crossed back into Mexico and notified the Border Patrol.
Agents discovered Mr. Valenzuela’s body on July 17, right where his friends said it would be, about two-and-a-half miles east of Lukeville, Ariz., not far from the border. Though decomposed, he was still recognizable.
“He’s got quite a few tattoos,” Dr. Porterfield said. “It is how the family ID’d him.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/29/us/29border.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1
Thursday, July 29, 2010
Arizona's Immigrant Death Spiral
The Daily Beast
July 29, 2010
by Bryan Curtis
Diego Gutierrez, a 25-year-old man Mexican man, illegally crossed the border into Arizona sometime around last Friday. Gutierrez was handsome and well built, with big eyes and a head of thick, black hair. In a photo taken by a Pima County medical examiner, he appeared to have a Roman nose. After trudging through the desert on days when temperatures at a nearby airfield reached 106 degrees, Gutierrez began to complain of stomach cramps. He vomited. Gutierrez’s father, who had crossed the border with him, left his son and flagged down a Border Patrol officer. The officer later reported that he and the father found Gutierrez’s body in the wee hours of Monday morning, July 26. Gutierrez was lying on his back under a tree; his head, fittingly enough, was pointed north.
Until a federal judge intervened Wednesday, Arizona's Senate Bill 1070 was set to go into effect with much talk of death. Explaining why the state’s police officers should ask anyone they deem suspicious to produce proof of citizenship, Gov. Jan Brewer spoke vividly of immigrant crime, drug cartels, “bodies in the desert.” In fact, authorities are finding many dead bodies in the Arizona desert these days, but they are not the victims of immigrant murderers. They are the immigrants themselves. What 1070 misses is that it’s far more dangerous to sneak into Arizona than it is to live here.
This month, there have been 58 dead migrants, including Diego Gutierrez, delivered to the medical examiner of Pima County, the large southern Arizona county that stretches from Tucson south to the border. One hundred and fifty-two dead border crossers have turned up in the office since January. To compare that number to much-fussed about immigrant crime statistics, 152 is more than the total number of people murdered in Phoenix, by anyone, in all of 2009. And if July’s migrant death toll won't reach the record total of July 2005, when the remains of 68 dead border-crossers turned up, Dr. Bruce Parks, the county’s chief medical examiner, told me he was concerned enough that he ordered a refrigerated truck to be parked outside his office to store the overflowing bodies.
Parks is a trim, balding man, and when I met him in his office Tuesday he was listening to jazz standards. When he performed on autopsy on Gutierrez's body the day before, Parks found him sadly unremarkable. Gutierrez had on blue jeans, a t-shirt, and sneakers, and he was carrying a Mexican voter registration card. He had scratches on his wrist, maybe from a cholla cactus or from sleeping under a mesquite tree. Parks showed me two photographs of Gutierrez’s body. The first was taken out in the desert, a body bag unzipped to reveal Gutierrez’s still-vital face. The second photo was taken by Parks himself some hours later at his office. Gutierrez’s face had turned a greenish-red color, and his chest and shoulders were marbled with blue lines. When Parks touched Gutierrez’s skin, he recalled, it gave way easily, because his body had filled with gas. There were no signs of trauma, which means Gutierrez had almost certainly died of hyperthermia. He was too hot.
Gutierrez is far away from the debate over 1070, but maybe he shouldn’t be. It’s a longstanding gambit of politicians—especially Arizona politicians—to say it’s easy for an immigrant to cross into the United States. But it’s probably harder to cross into Arizona and stay here than ever. After border-security pushes in California and Texas redirected migrant traffic to Arizona, the feds beefed up defenses in border cities like Nogales, built parts of a border wall—and Barack Obama has ordered more than 500 National Guardsmen sent to the Arizona border on August 1. Those measures, in turn, have pushed the migrant traffic into remote desert, into the Altar Valley to the east or the sprawling Tohono O’odham Indian Reservation to the west. It's telling that while the number of border crossers into Arizona has decreased in recent years due to the recession, the number of migrant deaths has gone up.
For an Arizona politician, the border is everything. For an immigrant, it is merely a starting line. After crossing the border, an immigrant in Arizona enters a dangerous neutral zone full of Border Patrol agents, jittery locals, and dangerous plants and reptiles. According to Dan Millis, a volunteer with No More Deaths, a group that provides water and food for immigrants in the desert, this zone can stretch for 30 miles depending on which of the spider web of migrant trails the immigrant follows toward a city or a highway.
Diego Gutierrez died in the neutral zone, and Millis and I drove out to the spot where his father flagged down the Border Patrol to get a sense of what he experienced. The Sonoran Desert has become such a reliable morgue that No More Deaths volunteers are always prepared to stumble upon bodies, Mills said, and “everybody thinks about it.” Millis is tall and bearded with twinkling eyes that disguise a thoughtful demeanor. He told me that he, too, discovered a body. In 2008, Millis and three friends were taking food to a migrant trail in the Altar Valley when they came upon the decomposing remains of a 14-year-old Mexican girl. The girl was lying on her back and her feet were floating in a puddle.
The remains matched the description of a girl named Josseline Janiletha Hernandez Quinteros who had gone missing three weeks before. She was easily identified because her sweatpants had “Hollywood” written on the seat. It had pleased Mills to provide closure for Hernandez’s family, some of whom would later come to the site to mark it as a memorial. But the act of discovery also weighed heavily on him. “It’s sort of a curse to find somebody dead,” he said.
After a two-hour drive through the reservation, past border patrolmen peeking into cars and scanning the horizon with binoculars, we came to the appointed spot, the 15th milepost on Route 21. Despite the lingering pall of death, the place was quite beautiful. The sun was making its final approach in the west, turning that part of the sky chalk-white and the eastern sky a deep, marine blue. Millis and I could hear bullfrogs burbling in some distant pool. The desert was both more ordinary and more cartoonish than what you see in the movies—an ugly, dusty track would be interrupted by a towering Saguaro cactus. You only had to take a few steps away from the car to feel desperately alone.
To think about the dreadful final moments of migrants like Gutierrez was to remove Arizona's immigration debate from rhetorical abstraction. There is no wave of immigrant crime in Arizona. Phoenix, according to the FBI, has one of the lowest rates of violent crime in the country. No Arizona county coroner has reported a beheaded crime victim in the desert, as Jan Brewer ominously charged. And yet when confronted with a bona fide epidemic in its southern desert, Arizona has chosen to punt.
As we looked around, I recalled something Bruce Parks, the medical examiner, had told me. When the truck bearing Gutierrez’s body came into his office, it was also carrying the bodies of three Guatemalan immigrants. Two of them had probably died like Diego, due to the hyperthermia. According to the field report, the third immigrant, adrift in a vast, hot desert, had hanged himself.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-07-28/arizonas-real-immigration-problem-migrant-deaths/
July 29, 2010
by Bryan Curtis
Diego Gutierrez, a 25-year-old man Mexican man, illegally crossed the border into Arizona sometime around last Friday. Gutierrez was handsome and well built, with big eyes and a head of thick, black hair. In a photo taken by a Pima County medical examiner, he appeared to have a Roman nose. After trudging through the desert on days when temperatures at a nearby airfield reached 106 degrees, Gutierrez began to complain of stomach cramps. He vomited. Gutierrez’s father, who had crossed the border with him, left his son and flagged down a Border Patrol officer. The officer later reported that he and the father found Gutierrez’s body in the wee hours of Monday morning, July 26. Gutierrez was lying on his back under a tree; his head, fittingly enough, was pointed north.
Until a federal judge intervened Wednesday, Arizona's Senate Bill 1070 was set to go into effect with much talk of death. Explaining why the state’s police officers should ask anyone they deem suspicious to produce proof of citizenship, Gov. Jan Brewer spoke vividly of immigrant crime, drug cartels, “bodies in the desert.” In fact, authorities are finding many dead bodies in the Arizona desert these days, but they are not the victims of immigrant murderers. They are the immigrants themselves. What 1070 misses is that it’s far more dangerous to sneak into Arizona than it is to live here.
This month, there have been 58 dead migrants, including Diego Gutierrez, delivered to the medical examiner of Pima County, the large southern Arizona county that stretches from Tucson south to the border. One hundred and fifty-two dead border crossers have turned up in the office since January. To compare that number to much-fussed about immigrant crime statistics, 152 is more than the total number of people murdered in Phoenix, by anyone, in all of 2009. And if July’s migrant death toll won't reach the record total of July 2005, when the remains of 68 dead border-crossers turned up, Dr. Bruce Parks, the county’s chief medical examiner, told me he was concerned enough that he ordered a refrigerated truck to be parked outside his office to store the overflowing bodies.
Parks is a trim, balding man, and when I met him in his office Tuesday he was listening to jazz standards. When he performed on autopsy on Gutierrez's body the day before, Parks found him sadly unremarkable. Gutierrez had on blue jeans, a t-shirt, and sneakers, and he was carrying a Mexican voter registration card. He had scratches on his wrist, maybe from a cholla cactus or from sleeping under a mesquite tree. Parks showed me two photographs of Gutierrez’s body. The first was taken out in the desert, a body bag unzipped to reveal Gutierrez’s still-vital face. The second photo was taken by Parks himself some hours later at his office. Gutierrez’s face had turned a greenish-red color, and his chest and shoulders were marbled with blue lines. When Parks touched Gutierrez’s skin, he recalled, it gave way easily, because his body had filled with gas. There were no signs of trauma, which means Gutierrez had almost certainly died of hyperthermia. He was too hot.
Gutierrez is far away from the debate over 1070, but maybe he shouldn’t be. It’s a longstanding gambit of politicians—especially Arizona politicians—to say it’s easy for an immigrant to cross into the United States. But it’s probably harder to cross into Arizona and stay here than ever. After border-security pushes in California and Texas redirected migrant traffic to Arizona, the feds beefed up defenses in border cities like Nogales, built parts of a border wall—and Barack Obama has ordered more than 500 National Guardsmen sent to the Arizona border on August 1. Those measures, in turn, have pushed the migrant traffic into remote desert, into the Altar Valley to the east or the sprawling Tohono O’odham Indian Reservation to the west. It's telling that while the number of border crossers into Arizona has decreased in recent years due to the recession, the number of migrant deaths has gone up.
For an Arizona politician, the border is everything. For an immigrant, it is merely a starting line. After crossing the border, an immigrant in Arizona enters a dangerous neutral zone full of Border Patrol agents, jittery locals, and dangerous plants and reptiles. According to Dan Millis, a volunteer with No More Deaths, a group that provides water and food for immigrants in the desert, this zone can stretch for 30 miles depending on which of the spider web of migrant trails the immigrant follows toward a city or a highway.
Diego Gutierrez died in the neutral zone, and Millis and I drove out to the spot where his father flagged down the Border Patrol to get a sense of what he experienced. The Sonoran Desert has become such a reliable morgue that No More Deaths volunteers are always prepared to stumble upon bodies, Mills said, and “everybody thinks about it.” Millis is tall and bearded with twinkling eyes that disguise a thoughtful demeanor. He told me that he, too, discovered a body. In 2008, Millis and three friends were taking food to a migrant trail in the Altar Valley when they came upon the decomposing remains of a 14-year-old Mexican girl. The girl was lying on her back and her feet were floating in a puddle.
The remains matched the description of a girl named Josseline Janiletha Hernandez Quinteros who had gone missing three weeks before. She was easily identified because her sweatpants had “Hollywood” written on the seat. It had pleased Mills to provide closure for Hernandez’s family, some of whom would later come to the site to mark it as a memorial. But the act of discovery also weighed heavily on him. “It’s sort of a curse to find somebody dead,” he said.
After a two-hour drive through the reservation, past border patrolmen peeking into cars and scanning the horizon with binoculars, we came to the appointed spot, the 15th milepost on Route 21. Despite the lingering pall of death, the place was quite beautiful. The sun was making its final approach in the west, turning that part of the sky chalk-white and the eastern sky a deep, marine blue. Millis and I could hear bullfrogs burbling in some distant pool. The desert was both more ordinary and more cartoonish than what you see in the movies—an ugly, dusty track would be interrupted by a towering Saguaro cactus. You only had to take a few steps away from the car to feel desperately alone.
To think about the dreadful final moments of migrants like Gutierrez was to remove Arizona's immigration debate from rhetorical abstraction. There is no wave of immigrant crime in Arizona. Phoenix, according to the FBI, has one of the lowest rates of violent crime in the country. No Arizona county coroner has reported a beheaded crime victim in the desert, as Jan Brewer ominously charged. And yet when confronted with a bona fide epidemic in its southern desert, Arizona has chosen to punt.
As we looked around, I recalled something Bruce Parks, the medical examiner, had told me. When the truck bearing Gutierrez’s body came into his office, it was also carrying the bodies of three Guatemalan immigrants. Two of them had probably died like Diego, due to the hyperthermia. According to the field report, the third immigrant, adrift in a vast, hot desert, had hanged himself.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-07-28/arizonas-real-immigration-problem-migrant-deaths/
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