Border Patrol Honors 97 Fallen Agents

http://www.elpasotimes.com/apps/pbcs.dl ... 80359/1001

Saturday, May 28, 2005

Remembering past efforts
Border Patrol honors 97 fallen agents

Louie Gilot
El Paso Times

Since 1924, 18 Border Patrol agents have died on duty in the El Paso sector.

On Friday, the agency honored them during a memorial ceremony at the Border Patrol Museum on Trans Mountain Road.

Connie Duran attended to represent her son, Roberto Duran, who died May 6, 2002, in a car crash near Casa Grande, Ariz. Roberto Duran, an El Pasoan, was assigned to Chula Vista, Calif., and temporarily deployed to Arizona. He had been a Border Patrol agent for five years.

"We were proud," said Connie Duran, of Santa Teresa. "You never think it's going to happen to your own."

Just before Duran died, he learned he would be transferred to Marfa, closer to El Paso and his family. He left behind four children.

The latest agent to die on duty in the El Paso sector was Rene Garza, a Lordsburg horse patrolman who collapsed from a cardiac arrest in 1999.

Since the agency was created in 1924, 97 agents have died on duty, including four after the Department of Homeland Security took over the Border Patrol in 2003. They're honored in a new display at the museum.

"We are so focused on our mission that we forget the very real dangers of our jobs," said Luis Barker, Border Patrol deputy chief in Washington, D.C. He is the former chief of the Border Patrol's El Paso sector, and returned to El Paso for the ceremony.

After Barker's speech, a riderless horse, with boots wedged backward in its stirrups, made its way slowly down the road.

Louie Gilot may be reached at lgilot@elpasotimes.com, 546-6131.

It is the saddest thing in the world, when we have those who risk their lives lose them, defending our interests. Border Patrol needs troop reinforcements NOW. For this President to have ignored this situation during his entire Presidency is a disgrace.

He has made himself irrelevant in the eyes of the American People. There is no program he can offer that the American People will Trust.

He has made himself a Lame Duck in the 4th month of his 4 year term...when he held a Press Conference to discuss social security during the week that American were waking up thanks to the Minute Man Project and needing reassurance that he cared about them; cared about their lives; cared about their neighborhoods; cared about their rights as American Citizens....and he gave us not so much as a syllable....and not one reporter dared broach the subject.

That was the last opportunity the man had to be our President.

For now, he is just another World Traveler on a US Expense Account, because we no longer know who or what he cares about or What in the World He is Doing or Has Done.

That Press Conference was the day that he said Good Bye to US, and We said to him, with sadness, Good Riddance.