Text 749, 122 rader
Skriven 2006-05-28 16:02:52 av Alan Hess
Ärende: through the drains
==========================
Is the war on illegal immigration like the War on Drugs and the fight against
prostitution, as in when demand for something (drugs, sex for pay, a new life
in the U.S.) is so great, there's no way to completely stop it, or come close? 
Better border control would certainly cut down illegal immigration, but how
many would still find a way to sneak in?
**********


http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/nationworld/bal-te.drains28may28,0,5893923.st
ory?coll=bal-pe-asection

From the Baltimore Sun
Smugglers use drain pipes to get migrants into U.S.


By Richard Marosi

May 28, 2006

SAN DIEGO -- Armando Reyes climbed over the border fence and prepared for the
dash into San Diego. But his smuggler instead led him and four other migrants
through a patch of reeds to a stinky drainage pipe and ordered them inside.

The black sludge reached Reyes' chin as he crawled through the shoulder-width
tube. Rats scurried by. Terrified of losing his way in the darkness, Reyes
reached for the migrant in front of him and clutched his sneaker.

The stocky 28-year-old from Oaxaca had followed the smuggler into a labyrinth
of drainage pipes under Otay Mesa, the booming commercial area 15 miles
southeast of downtown San Diego.

The 23-mile network leads to more than 500 manholes scattered across about two
square miles. From those openings, mud-covered migrants crawl out into streets,
busy intersections and parking lots, creating a dizzying guessing game for U.S.
Border Patrol agents.

"They're popping up all over the place," said Joe Perez, the agent in charge of
the area.

The migrant traffic below truck-clogged streets and new office parks
underscores the persistence and desperation of people faced with crossing one
of the most heavily fortified sections of the border.

Illegal crossings will soon become tougher. President Bush is sending 6,000
National Guard troops to the border, Congress is considering an enforcement
plan, and next month this busy stretch of border at Tijuana will be monitored
by remote surveillance cameras.

So the underground beckons.

The tunnels channel rainwater out of flood-prone areas, but when the waters
aren't running, the waves of migrants flow, a phenomenon that has bedeviled
agents for years and has gotten worse recently as aboveground routes have been
more heavily patrolled.

Last month migrants surfaced outside the offices of the U.S. Border Tunnel Task
Force. After that, the manhole covers - one in a secured parking lot - were
welded shut, one of them also topped with three 35-pound bags of rocks and
gravel.

But six more manholes, all potential escape hatches, lie within a block of the
federal facility. "They're all interlinked, so you never know where they'll
come up," said David Badger, a Border Patrol supervisor.

Other border cities have wrestled with similar situations, most notably
Nogales, Ariz., which is linked underground to Nogales, Mexico, by two large
storm-drain tunnels patrolled regularly by heavily armed agents.

Unlike in Nogales, the drainage system in the Otay Mesa area doesn't extend
into Mexico. But most of the tunnel outlets are a quick run from the border.
Migrants typically traverse the pipes, many of which are two to three feet in
diameter, at night, sometimes crawling for hours. Vehicles waiting on deserted
streets then whisk them to stash houses.

Border Patrol agents have arrested hundreds of migrants climbing out of storm
drains in the past year, but they don't know how many get through. Some
estimate that thousands make it.

Last year, a worker for the California Department of Transportation said he saw
200 migrants climb out of a manhole in the middle of a California 905
interchange. Last month, 17 people were captured after they jumped out of a
manhole near the Drug Enforcement Administration building that houses the
tunnel task force. And this month, 15 people were arrested outside a warehouse
just north of the border after an agent heard the scraping sound of a manhole
cover being slid open.

The problem has grown serious enough that agents are teaming up with San Diego
city engineers to create a computer map of the system. And research is under
way to find a way to attach sensors to manholes to alert agents when they are
opened. Crews have welded shut about a dozen manholes known to be migrant
funnels.

At the tunnel task force, the federal multiagency group credited with the
discovery in January of the longest illegal tunnel under the border ever found,
a top official said the storm drains present a unique problem.

"It's not like when you have ... a drug tunnel. We can't go in there and just
fill them up with cement," said Michael Unzueta, the special agent in charge of
Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The federal task force focuses on unearthing drug tunnels built by
organized-crime groups. Policing the city's storm drain system is the
responsibility of the Border Patrol.

Reyes, who was headed for Los Angeles, said his smuggler told him the crawl
would take five minutes, but half an hour later he was still inching along. It
was cold and so dark, he said, that he couldn't see his hand in front of his
face. "I didn't want to get lost. ... I just wanted to get out of there," he
said.

When he surfaced, agents, who had been watching the manhole in a warehouse
district a quarter-mile north of the border, arrested him and 10 others. At the
processing center in Chula Vista, agents hosed off the migrants, who were
covered in muck from head to toe.

Richard Marosi writes for the Los Angeles Times. The Times' H.G. Reza
contributed to this article.

Copyright + 2006, The Baltimore Sun | Get Sun home delivery

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