Thread: Immigrant deaths along Ariz. border drop 38%

Immigrant deaths along Ariz. border drop 38%
Migrant deaths along the Arizona border are down significantly this year, corresponding with a sharp drop in apprehensions by the Border Patrol.
By Daniel Gonzalez
The Arizona Republic
Posted 3h 50m ago

The Border Patrol's Tucson Sector has recorded 132 migrant deaths through July 31, compared with the 212 migrant deaths logged during the same 10-month period in the fiscal year before.

That 38% drop corresponds with a 44% drop in illegal-immigrant apprehensions by the Tucson Sector, which covers the majority of Arizona's border with Mexico. The sector made 108,900 apprehensions through July 31, compared with 194,065 during the same period last year.

The drop in apprehensions is widely viewed as an indication that fewer migrants are crossing illegally through the Arizona desert.

But Border Patrol officials were hesitant to draw a link between the drop in migrant deaths and the drop in apprehensions. Last fiscal year, Oct. 1 to Sept. 30, the agency also recorded a drop in illegal-immigrant apprehensions, but migrant deaths soared that year to 249, a record.

Causes of death are typically dehydration, exposure to heat and sometimes cold, motor-vehicle accidents and train accidents. But often, Border Patrol agents find only skeletal remains, making the cause of death difficult to explain.

"While apprehensions continue to decline, the Sonoran Desert remains a very dangerous place to cross illegally," said Agent Andy Adame, a spokesman for the Tucson Sector.

The Yuma Sector, which includes the western edge of Arizona's border with Mexico, has recorded one migrant death so far this year, said Robert Lowry, a Border Patrol spokesman. The death, which occurred this summer, was the first recorded in the Yuma Sector since at least 2007, he said. Apprehensions in the sector are down 23% so far this year, Lowry said.

The end of the fiscal year, Sept. 30, is seven weeks away. At the current pace, migrant deaths in the Tucson Sector, the nation's busiest, are on pace to fall to their lowest level in years. The Tucson Sector counted 212 migrant deaths in 2009, 171 in 2008, 202 in 2007 and 169 in 2006.

In the past, some critics have blamed the rise in migrant deaths on Border Patrol policies that have pushed migrants and smugglers into more remote and dangerous areas of the desert.

But although enforcement increased, migrant deaths declined this year.

Adame said more border enforcement has deterred migrants from crossing illegally.

In January, the Tucson Sector also launched a new program that prosecutes nearly all migrants for entering illegally. As a result of the prosecutions, migrants are formally ordered deported by immigration judges instead of simply allowing them to voluntarily return to their country. Migrants who have been formally deported face criminal charges if caught re-entering the country illegally.

The Border Patrol also conducted a publicity campaign with journalists from interior states in Mexico to help warn would-be migrants about the dangers of crossing illegally through the desert, Adame said.

The southern Arizona humanitarian group No More Deaths, which relies on data gathered separately from the Border Patrol, counted 142 migrant deaths in Arizona from Oct. 1 to July 31, according to the group's website. That is nine more than the 133 counted by the Tucson and Yuma sectors.

Jaime Farrant, policy director for the Border Action Network, a human-rights advocacy organization, said it's hard to say why migrant deaths are down so significantly this year. "We don't know necessarily why," he said.

"It might be that there are less people crossing."

But he cited a broader mix of factors for the decrease in illegal immigration, including more border enforcement, inclement weather and fewer jobs.

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sure they are all In our city . & all the other city . In NY
get them the hell Out
No amnesty