Assaults on undocumented migrants continue in county

By Denise Holley
Published Tuesday, December 1, 2009 9:44 AM MST

A man bleeding from two bullet holes in his leg knocked on the door of a home near the end of Peck Canyon Drive about 9:46 p.m. Nov. 21, according to the Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office.

The man, an undocumented Mexican national, told deputies that assailants dressed in black with automatic weapons accosted him and his traveling companions, said Communications Officer Javier De La Ossa. After the man was shot in a canyon west of the road’s end, he limped for about an hour to reach the house.

Deputies and medical personnel from the Tubac Fire District called a helicopter to airlift the man to University Medical Center in Tucson.

On Nov. 19, deputies found three Mexican nationals on the access road off the Palo Parado exit from Interstate 19, De La Ossa said. The men said they had been robbed at knifepoint in a mountainous area.

Two more undocumented migrants from Mexico reported a robbery Nov. 23 after deputies picked them up as they walked south on I-19 near the Peck Canyon exit, De La Ossa said.

The men described a location that deputies believed was the Lochiel area of the San Rafael Valley. Their assailants wore dark clothes and ski masks and carried automatic weapons, De La Ossa said. After taking the report, deputies turned the men over to the Border Patrol.

A total of 43 individuals have reported armed robberies in the back country of Santa Cruz County since Jan. 1, Sheriff Antonio Estrada told county supervisors on Nov. 25. This did not include victims of sexual assaults.

“They’re very difficult cases to pursue,â€