Thread: Houston-- Who says Smugglers are Nice People

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/5405697.html

Boy's kidnappers promise revenge if family cooperates with authorities, mom says

By JAMES PINKERTON
Copyright 2007 Houston Chronicle

Human traffickers are threatening family members of a Houston boy who was kidnapped in an apparent Christmas Eve dispute over $4,000 owed for smuggling his sister from Mexico, the boy's mother said.

Francisca Torres, 37, said Wednesday she has received three calls at her home from smugglers since her son Luis Antonio Gonzalez, 14, was freed by authorities in Austin and returned to Houston late Christmas Day.

''They don't want money. They are telling me to retract my statement, to say it was a mistake, a misunderstanding," Torres said. ''It's a big organization they have, and they could hurt us here and in Mexico."

During the calls, she said the smugglers threatened relatives in Houston and Mexico with harm if they continued to cooperate with authorities.

Torres also said smugglers mentioned the location of her youngest daughter, who is expecting a baby and lives in Mexico.

One of the men who held her son told him they were connected to the feared Zetas, a group of Mexican military defectors who are assassins and enforcers for the Gulf Cartel drug trafficking ring.

''We are afraid — afraid of the smugglers and afraid of the immigration authorities," said Torres, acknowledging they could be deported because they are illegal immigrants.

And at their modest home on Wednesday, the family seemed to be on edge. Every time a car would stop along the street outside, either Luis or his younger brother would peer out from the curtains.

A spokeswoman with Immigration and Customs Enforcement would not comment on the threats or whether the family faces deportation, citing the early stage of a ''fluid" investigation.

''Agents are trying to see which story matches what actually happened," said Nina Pruneda, a spokeswoman with ICE in San Antonio. "We're trying to get down to the nuts and bolts of what happened."


Kidnapping charges
Harris County deputies have filed kidnapping charges against Santos Vasquez, 37, who they identified as the suspect who abducted the teenager from a gasoline station at U.S. 290 and Becker on Christmas Eve. Vasquez was transferred from a San Marcos jail to the Harris County Jail on Wednesday.

Sgt. Dennis Field, a homicide detective with the Harris County Sheriff's Office, said it was not clear whether the family will be subject to deportation or allowed to remain in the country as material witnesses.

''We do need them as witnesses in the case against Santos Vasquez," he said.

Clients of human trafficking rings who are held captive to perform work or to repay smuggling fees can apply for special federal T visas for victims of extreme trafficking.

Pruneda said it was too early to comment on a trafficking visa.

''Right now we're happy the family was reunited, and the boy was found to be in good health," Pruneda said. ''With respect to their immigration status, that is yet to be determined."

Field said local officials ''seldom get these cases" because the victims are reluctant to report them because of their immigration status.

However, he said, ''It's not uncommon for (smugglers) to set a price originally, and then they raise the price once they have the person in the country."


Their fee had risen
Francisca Torres explained that she, her brother and her son met Vasquez late Monday afternoon at a north Houston gas station as he delivered her 20-year-old daughter and a grandchild. The two had been smuggled across the Rio Grande and brought to Houston over the weekend.

However, Torres said, smugglers informed her their $2,800 fee had risen to $4,000. But Torres said she had only $900. A last-minute loan she arranged to cover the difference fell through.

Torres said Vasquez agreed to accept the titles to a pair of family vehicles until they could get money when banks opened Wednesday. Her daughter and granddaughter left in her brother's car, and she and Luis went with Vasquez, Torres said.

However, Torres said, Vasquez changed his mind and decided not to take them to get the car titles. She asked him to stop at a second gas station to use the bathroom, and when she came out, he had left with her son. The clerk at the gas station phoned authorities, Torres said.


Eighth-grader's ordeal

Austin police, along with Harris County sheriff's deputies and Texas Rangers, freed the 14-year-old at an Austin apartment after detectives contacted Vasquez by cell phone.

''It was 24 hours of being worried, not so much fear, but worry about my family," Luis, an eighth-grader, said about his ordeal.

Four men were taken into custody in or near the southeast Austin apartment, including Jamie Segura Ramos, 42, who fled the apartment as police arrived. Pruneda said Segura, a native of Mexico, has been charged with illegal re-entry after being deported by ICE in May 2006.

The other three men had no knowledge of the kidnapping, officials said. ICE officials have filed immigration charges of illegal entry against those three. The trio was living in the apartment and told Luis that they were being forced to live there while they worked off smuggling fees.

And at their modest home on Wednesday, the family seemed to be on edge. Every time a car would stop along the street outside, either Luis or his younger brother would peer out from the curtains.

I say hold them in protective custody until they get the kidnapper, then deport them

Hi Jamesw62,

Originally Posted by jamesw62

Who says Smugglers are Nice People?

Teddy Kennedy said that, when he issued the proclamation that all illegals (including MS13, smugglers, criminals) are decent and hard working. Kennedy speaks for all democrats and elitist globalists.