Illegal immigrant found stranded under border bridge

Associated Press - April 21, 2008 7:05 PM ET

EL PASO, Texas (AP) - A 33-year-old would-be illegal immigrant from Chile was halfway to freedom. That's when his apparent plan to sneak into the United States from Mexico derailed.

Authorities say Rafael Ernesto Corvalan Herrera was arrested yesterday afternoon after he got stuck in the rafters underneath an international bridge over the Rio Grande. He told U.S. Border Patrol agents that a wheel on a makeshift cart he was using to shuttle himself along the bridge's support beams broke. He was left stranded in the middle of the span, at least 20 feet off the ground.

Agents have been paying particular attention to the rafters of international bridges in El Paso since last year. That's when a similarly crude system for smuggling drugs from Ciudad Juarez into El Paso was discovered.

Pole-mounted cameras trained on the border don't record images from underneath the bridges.

Corvalan is a registered sex offender in Florida. He told agents that smugglers in Mexico had arranged to get a group of people across the river using the cart.

It's unclear how many people may have used the cart and rail system before Corvalan was found.

Corvalan is being held without bond at the El Paso County jail and faces a federal felony charge of illegally entering the country after being deported.

Jail records do not show if Corvalan has a lawyer.

http://www.kcbd.com/Global/story.asp?S= ... v=menu69_3