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Border death toll sets record

By: WILLIAM FINN BENNETT - Staff Writer

The death count for illegal immigrants trying to cross the U.S.-Mexican border has hit a record high, U.S. Border Patrol officials reported Thursday.

With 28 days left in the Border Patrol's fiscal year, which runs from Oct. 1 to Sept. 30, a total of 415 men, women and children have died making the northward journey, said Mario Villarreal, a Washington spokesman for U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

Two hundred forty of those deaths came in the harsh desert landscape of Southern Arizona, mainly from dehydration, he added.


The Southwest border's previous record for immigrant deaths was 383, in 2000. This year's total of 415 has already surpassed that number by more than 8 percent. And with the National Weather Service forecasting 100-degree-plus temperatures for the desert along the border this month, a human rights official said Thursday that he is worried the death toll will continue to rise.

"Already, this is the deadliest year in 10 years and knowing that the hottest part of the year is a month from being over, we are potentially looking at a disaster," said Christian Ramirez, the San Diego office director of American Friends Service Committee, an organization that provides humanitarian assistance to immigrants along the Southwest border.

The Border Patrol's San Diego sector stretches from the coast to the Imperial County line. With 20 deaths so far this fiscal year, it represents a small fraction of the total number of deaths.

However, that number is still higher than last year, when 15 people died during the entire fiscal year, Villarreal said. While none of those deaths was caused by dehydration, Border Patrol agents have rescued 11 people for heat-related symptoms in the same period, Border Patrol records show.

Rather than creating a comprehensive immigration policy that would allow for the safe and orderly flow of needed workers into the United States, the American government has focused on border enforcement, Ramirez said. And that policy has come at a fatal price for many immigrants, he added.

The initiation of Operation Gatekeeper in 1994 ---- a U.S. program that reinforced the border by installing more fences, lighting and motion sensors ---- began pushing illegal border crossers farther east, first into the mountains of east San Diego County, then into the desert in Imperial County and Arizona.

In 1998, the U.S. Border Patrol began requesting data on immigrant deaths from county medical examiners along the Southwest border and correlating that information with Border Patrol data. Since that program began, the Border Patrol has registered the deaths of 2,640 immigrants, federal records show.

Villarreal said that while each of those deaths is tragic, it is important to note that since 1998, the Border Patrol's Search, Trauma and Rescue Team has rescued 11,428 illegal immigrants along the Southwest border, 2,466 of them just this fiscal year.

Ramirez said he blames Operation Gatekeeper for the increase in deaths, as it pushes immigrants into more remote and dangerous locations.

"After 11 years, we still haven't learned that border policies have failed; all those policies have done is increase the injuries and deaths of migrants."

Asked if he believes that increased border enforcement is partially responsible for the increase in deaths, Villarreal said no. He blames immigrant smugglers for the rising death toll.

"They cross them in some of the most desolate, rugged places this country has to offer," he said. "When an individual in the group is unable to continue due to fatigue, illness or injury, the smuggler will abandon them and continue moving the group of illegal aliens north," he said.

In an effort to reduce the number of deaths along the border, the Border Patrol recently began a major radio and TV advertising campaign in Mexico to educate would-be illegal immigrants on the dangers of entering the United States illegally.

"What we are trying to do is (teach them) before they are committed to making the trek north to the border of the dangers ... that are out there, that are real," Villarreal said.

In addition, the U.S. and Mexican governments recently began a voluntary repatriation program that provides air transportation to illegal immigrants who want to return to their homes far south of the border, he said. More than 15,000 illegal immigrants have already taken advantage of the offer, he added.

The program is designed to decrease the number of people that are released just across the border, only to return a short time later, Villarreal said.

State Sen. Bill Morrow has long declared himself to be a staunch supporter of stronger border enforcement.

He said that nobody likes the idea of people dying at the border, "but if the United States would gear up the political will to enforce its laws, it would actually be an act of compassion," Morrow said. "The border is something the United States can certainly control. If we caught them, they wouldn't be losing their lives."

He said the Mexican government must also accept responsibility for deaths along the border.

"(Mexico) should take strong action in the interests of its own citizens," he said.