VAN HORN, Texas — Culberson County Sheriff Oscar Carrillo is haunted by the sight last year of a father clinging to life next to his son who succumbed to the brutal heat in an unforgiving desert.
The father shared an all-too-familiar story with Carrillo — of migrants risking it all to reach the United States, battling triple-digit heat waves only to be abandoned by unscrupulous smugglers.
But this year, as a rising number of migrants cross the sweltering desert of West Texas, where temperatures for almost 10 consecutive days have neared 110 degrees, Carrillo said he remains worried, though hopeful. So far, he and his office have found the remains of four people, down from around 20 last year.
“New technology, so far, has been very effective,” said Carrillo, a six-term sheriff in Culberson County, about 120 miles east of El Paso, which last year saw a record number of people dying in the rugged expanse of mountainous terrain of West Texas.
Carrillo encountered so many bodies that he began carrying body bags in his truck, along with his standard bulletproof vest.
“It’s miserable out there, but so far we have rescued quite a few people in distress because of new tools and that’s encouraging,” he said.
The sheriff is referring to what the U.S. Border Patrol calls a “force multiplier.” They include the addition of dozens of so-called 30-foot-tall solar powered rescue beacons, which provide a lifeline to the migrants who find themselves lost and in need of help.
Additional rescue beacons with added technology went up this year in the El Paso and Big Bend sectors and that includes Culberson County, one of the most treacherous areas for migrants because of its isolation.
Hundreds of 911 metal placards with a number code at the bottom for migrants to call from their own cellphones and alert agents of their location. The calls are triangulated with other authorities, including Carrillo’s sheriff’s office.
Then there are the solar-powered “autonomous surveillance towers,” or ASTs. These moveable towers come complete with an artificial intelligence system that relies on thermal imaging, cameras and radar to help determine whether a moving object is an animal, vehicle or person. Each one beams its location coordinates to U.S. Border Patrol agents.
Beyond providing a way to spot people crossing the border, the surveillance towers also “provide agents with situational awareness on migrants in distress that are in need of rescue,” said Landon Hutchens, a spokesman for U.S, Customs Border Protection, or CPB, for the El Paso sector.
The deadliest year
In fiscal year 2021, agents performed 688 rescues. So far in fiscal year 2022, which began in October, agents have performed more than 350 rescues, though the difficult days of summer have yet to start, said Carlos Rivera, spokesman for the U.S. Border Patrol El Paso Sector.
“We encourage migrants to come up to a beacon, or a 911 metal placard and either press the button to seek help, rather than expose themselves to potential death in the desert,” Rivera explained, adding it’s too early to determine with statistics how effective the new tools have been.
But anecdotally, at least two rescues were due to 911 placards and at least five because migrants pressed buttons of rescue beacons. This year the sector has recorded 23 deaths due to falls from the border wall, hypothermia, drownings and heat strokes.
“That’s 23 deaths too many,” Rivera said, adding that the sector recorded 39 deaths a year ago.
The International Organization for Migration, a United Nations agency based in Switzerland, found 2021 was a record deadly year for migrants crossing the U.S.-Mexico border. Last December, the agency said at least 650 people died along the U.S.-Mexico border in 2021, marking the deadliest year since the agency began recording in 2014.
Fernando Garcia, executive director of the Border Network for Human Rights, estimates the death toll is actually higher. Garcia blames Title 42, a Trump-era pandemic health order, which remains in place during the Biden administration, for so many dead.
The policy calls for migrants to be immediately sent back to Mexico without an opportunity to request humanitarian protection in the United States because of what officials say is an effort to thwart the coronavirus pandemic. Many found in the exceptionally remote counties of Culberson, Presidio, Hudspeth or El Paso simply return to the vast Chihuahuan desert and start walking again.
“The more deterrence migrants face, the greater the profits are for smugglers because it’s easy money and they face little to no consequences,” said Garcia. “The U.S. government has blood on its hands too,” he said, calling for comprehensive immigration reform.
Other threats
But extreme heat is just one of the life-threatening obstacles migrants face in their perilous journey north, Hutchens added. Migrants are also drowning in irrigation canals which are full this time of year because water has been released from Elephant Butte Dam in New Mexico and into the Rio Grande, and then diverted into a network of canals along the border.
One week in June, at least three bodies were recovered along the El Paso border region. Several more were rescued. (The Border Patrol plans a media demonstration later this month to warn migrants of the dangers of crossing the border during the summer.)
The FBI and other law enforcement agencies are also doubling down on calls for residents to report any suspicious activity in their neighborhoods that could indicate a “stash house” as a growing number of migrants are being held for ransom in the El Paso region.
The FBI, U.S. Border Patrol and Texas Department of Public Safety recently rescued 14 undocumented migrants held in stash houses against their will in the El Paso region.
Overall, 65 victims have been rescued since February, said Special Agent in Charge Jeffrey R. Downey, who urged the community to come forward and help “eradicate this violent crime from existing in our city and help protect a vulnerable population.”
Federal agents arrested a man identified as Emigdio Gonzalez-Gamboa, 33, at his Anthony, New Mexico, home and charged him with harboring undocumented migrants, including a Honduran woman held for six weeks.
“So, if you don’t get killed in the rival cartel wars, or you don’t die in the desert or drown in the canal — let’s say you finally make it to a stash house, after you paid your good hard-earned money to be smuggled into the United States — your family still has to cough up money for kidnapping and ransom fees,” Hutchens said. “The smugglers are the scum of the earth.”
Carrillo doesn’t see any imminent end to the migration, his focus, he said, is on solving local crime, from cattle thefts to break-ins. Still, he never strays away from the Chihuahuan desert where too many die annually from heatstroke, or dehydration, or a winter freeze, because all too often migrants are left behind by smugglers.
Last year, there were 34, including a 15-year-old boy from Ecuador. He traveled north with his 35-year-old father who had returned from New York to reunite with his son and take him north. The two were abandoned by their smuggler. Carrillo and a deputy found the pair. The son died. The father was transported to a hospital and after recovering was sent to Mexico.
Carrillo never heard back from him, but he won’t forget the story, which he said is a reminder of the need to help families looking to find closure. He often posts details of the remains he finds on his personal Facebook page and connects with families from throughout Latin America or the U.S. eager for information on their loved ones.
That’s why the sight of rescue beacons — a total of 17, plus two more to come soon — and the nearly 100 metal placards in the Border Patrol Big Bend Sector that includes Culberson County gives Carrillo hope that this year may be different.
His office, with 10 deputies, is averaging about 15 “distress” calls per week, or “that’s 15 calls that could have been deadly,” he said.
“June is supposed to be the hottest month and July won’t get much better,” he said. “We better find a way to save lives because nothing seems to stop these people from coming across.”
