Steve Quayle News Alerts

June 9, 2002

At least seven illegal entrants have died since Thursday while crossing the U.S.-Mexican border southwest of Tucson as the heat reached unbearable levels.

The victims succumbed one by one in a slow-motion disaster that gained momentum Friday and Saturday, forcing law-enforcement officers and ambulance services to scramble to rescue at least 70 other border-crossers in peril. At least eight have been hospitalized since Thursday, said U.S. Border Patrol spokesman Ryan Scudder.

Ajo Ambulance set up a triage station to handle the dozens of dehydrated migrants found Friday and early Saturday. At the Mexican consulate in Tucson, employees worked at a frenzied pace, helping to identify victims, notify their families and care for survivors, even as more reports came in.

Agents of the Border Patrol's emergency-response team, who have been working almost non-stop since Thursday, were involved in additional rescue operations late Saturday.

In one case late Friday night, the Border Patrol received a cell-phone call from someone who said he was with a group of 43 people, Scudder said.

"One has already died, and the others may die also," the caller said, according to Scudder.

Based on the caller's description of the area, agents, aided by the Pima County Sheriff's Department were able to find the group near the Ajo Mountains.

Another of the victims in the rash of border deaths was a young Mexican woman traveling with her husband and 2-year-old son. Her husband, Reyes Paez Martinez, described the family's ill-fated trip during an interview in a Tucson motel Saturday as he waited to return with his son to their impoverished hometown in central Mexico.

Paez Martinez, 21, his wife, Norma Rodriguez Amado, 22, and their son Alexander were staying in Sonoyta, Sonora, Thursday when their guide rousted them from their rented room to make the cross-border journey, Paez Martinez said. There were seven people in their group, including the guide.

It was noontime, and they piled into a pickup and traveled for an hour across the border in a remote area, he said, an area that was probably in Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. The truck stopped near a highway and the group ran fast away from the paved road for about five minutes.

Then, during the hottest part of the day, when the temperature reached 108 degrees in the shade, the group started to walk, Paez Martinez said. He carried young Alexander on his shoulders.

Within two hours, Paez Martinez said, his wife collapsed. But the guide insisted on continuing, and left him behind with his wife, their son, and a friend who also was in the group.

"She was chubby, so I think the heat harmed her," he said.

Within 45 minutes, she was dead, Paez Martinez said, and they decided that since they were running out of water, they should go find help. After a couple more hours, they heard Border Patrol agents shouting and went to meet the agents.

"I yelled at them. I said 'Amigos, I'm here!' " he recalled. "I said, 'I need help. I need you to help me bring out my wife.' "

Reaching this point in the story, Paez Martinez started to sob, even as young Alexander nodded off, unaware of his father's anguish or the reason his mother was gone.

"I tell him that she went to the store," Paez Martinez said.

Rodriguez Amado was one of at least two victims who perished a relatively short time into their cross-border treks, said David Aguilar, chief of the Border Patrol's Tucson Sector.

"The last call I had this morning was about a young woman that died right on the border, literally 20 meters from the fence, right there on the border road," Aguilar said. "I think that goes to the fact that these people are already in distress long before they reach the border."

In the case of the group found near the Ajo Mountains, when agents arrived, the caller and his cellphone were no longer with them, Scudder said. That could indicate the caller was the group's guide or was otherwise related to the people-smuggling operation.

"They often will carry a cellphone in order to call for the load car," Scudder said.

A man suspected of smuggling that group was arrested and in Border Patrol custody Saturday, Scudder said. It appeared he was apprehended separately from the rest of the group but was identified by other members as their smuggler.

Those with stamina are also falling victim to the heat far north of the border, near Arizona 86. Tohono O'odham Police Chief Larry Seligman said that while driving from Tucson to Sells Saturday morning, he saw about 10 border-crossers in smaller groups by the side of the road needing help.

Six of the seven known victims died on the Tohono O'odham Reservation, Seligman said. When he left in the afternoon, officers were making a run to buy Gatorade and water for another group of dehydrated illegal entrants.

"We've got to get people not to do this. It's too dangerous," Seligman said.

Paez Martinez said he was unaware of the danger when he brought his wife and young son to the border. He said he had crossed in early 1999, when his wife was three months pregnant with their son. He lived in Tennessee and Florida for nearly three years, then returned to his hometown in Morelos state in December and saw Alexander for the first time. Soon after, he had the bug to return to the United States.

"I said, 'Honey, let's go. It's really nice,' " he said.

Around 300 of the town's 11,000 inhabitants have left for the United States, and none had significant problems, Paez Martinez said. He didn't consider that they wouldn't make it.

"I regret it, but now I can't do anything. It's too late."
By Tim Steller and Ignacio Ibarra, ARIZONA DAILY STAR
http://www.azstarnet.com/star/today/20609DEADLYCROSSINGS.html