48 Video Cameras Now Help Patrol The Border

Last Updated:
06-28-06 at 6:16PM

Border Patrol agents say new video cameras along a 5.2-mile stretch of the U.S.-Mexico border are helping cut down illegal crossings and increase apprehensions of illegal immigrants.

Agents say the 48 new cameras enable them to get a bird's eye view of those trying to enter the United States illegally, and then track them until they are detained.

"It's like having a second pair of eyes out there," said Wendi Lee, a Border Patrol spokeswoman. "This will help us monitor the area and let the agents in the field know what's going on out there."

Three Border Patrol agents watch a bank of 24 TV monitors in an office in San Ysidro, San Diego's crossing into Mexico and the busiest land border in the world.

The cameras are mounted on 12 poles placed evenly along the north side of a reinforced second border fence that runs east from the San Ysidro border crossing to the Otay Mesa Port of Entry. Each 50-foot pole has four cameras, two for daylight, and two for nighttime use.

Al Gumbs, a Border Patrol agent monitoring the camera system, said 191 suspected illegal immigrants were apprehended in the first week after agents began using the cameras on May 18.

Border officials say apprehensions in the San Diego sector totaled 126,913 in the year that ended Sept. 30. Since then, there have been 108,497.

Cameras have been used in other border areas in California, as well as in Texas and Arizona.
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