Migrant smugglers growing bolder on New Mexico roads
Drivers speeding through highway checkpoints with migrants in car trunks
by: Julian Resendiz
Posted: Mar 21, 2023 / 05:51 PM CDT
Updated: Mar 21, 2023 / 06:02 PM CDT
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EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – Migrant smugglers are growing bolder on New Mexico roads, speeding through highway checkpoints with people hidden in car trunks, court documents show.
The smuggling activity often transcends state borders, with drivers picking up migrants in Arizona and taking them through New Mexico or hooking up with their charges in communities like Sunland Park and Santa Teresa and ending up in El Paso, Texas. Pursuits often involve drivers unwilling to stop for law enforcement and sometimes end with deflated tires and smugglers and migrants being airlifted to hospitals, records show.
Most of the drivers are U.S. citizens – sometimes teenagers – recruited for money by acquaintances who are part of smuggling networks. Others responded to social media postings. In some cases, the driver was an undocumented migrant seeking to pay off installments of his debt to the “coyotes,” the court filings show.
https://www.borderreport.com/immigration/border-crime/migrant-smugglers-growing-bolder-on-new-mexico-roads/
