News From the Border

Providing the news from a different front but from a war that we must win as well! I recognize the poverty and desperate conditions that many Latinos live in. We, as the USA, have a responsibility to do as much as we can to reach out to aid and assist spiritually with the Gospel and naturally with training, technology and resources. But poverty gives no one the right to break the laws of another sovereign nation.

Monday, July 03, 2006

Del Rio border influx drops

Immigrant jail policy, Guard presence are given credit for fewer arrests

By JOHN W. GONZALEZ
Copyright 2006 Houston Chronicle San Antonio Bureau

DEL RIO - Nearly 5,000 immigrants were arrested in June 2005 trying to enter the United States illegally through this area. But this June, only about 2,000 people were nabbed after crossing the perilous Rio Grande into the stark and punishing brush country of southwest Texas.

Long overwhelmed by immigrants and smugglers, U.S. Border Patrol officials last week said traffic into the region has plummeted because of increased law enforcement, deployment of the National Guard and an experiment with expedited hearings to curtail the "catch-and-release" phenomenon.

"Everything together has just stopped the traffic," supervisory patrol agent Hilario Leal Jr. said.

As a direct result, smuggling is shifting as far away as Arizona, officials said. And in a meeting here last week with Gov. Rick Perry, several border county sheriffs said the drop in immigrant flow corresponds with significant reductions in major crimes.

posted by missionaryman | 6:30 AM

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home