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Yahoo
19 hours ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Federal prosecutors score first wins on NM border trespass cases
Jun. 19—The first two migrants convicted of trespassing into the so-called New Mexico National Defense Area this month should have known better. The two Mexican nationals had previously faced the same "novel" immigration-related trespassing charges just a month ago when they illegally crossed into the U.S. and were arrested by the U.S. Border Patrol in Doña Ana County. But like dozens of others caught in the Trump administration's new southern border enforcement crackdown, their misdemeanor trespassing charges didn't stick because of legal issues. So Eduardo Herrera-Juvencio and Andres De Los Santos-Martinez ended up being released from custody and deported back to Mexico, only to illegally cross into the same New Mexico military zone, west of the Santa Teresa port of entry, on June 1. This time, the defendants' prior prosecutions meant that they had been forewarned, making it more difficult to argue they didn't know they had stepped into the 60-foot-wide buffer zone, which was designated as a military property in mid-April. The U.S. Army assumed authority over a 170-mile-long buffer zone adjacent to the U.S.-Mexico border in New Mexico. A similar zone was created for a 63-mile-long strip in West Texas. Federal authorities charged the two men with reentry after deportation and the military trespass charges, which carry additional potential prison time of up to a year. On Thursday, the U.S. Attorney's Office in New Mexico announced the defendants had pleaded guilty to all three misdemeanors. "These first convictions reflect the resolve of the United States Attorney's Office to do its part in securing our nation's southern border," U.S. Attorney for New Mexico Ryan Ellison said in a statement. "I am tremendously proud of our staff in the Las Cruces branch office, the U.S. Border Patrol and the U.S. military for their relentless efforts to secure our southern border. New Mexico — and the entire country — is more secure because of these efforts." The men's federal public defenders couldn't be reached, and it wasn't clear from court records on Thursday when they will be sentenced. Over recent weeks, federal defense attorneys have argued that such prosecutions are flawed because of legal issues over whether migrants knew of the military restriction and whether federal prosecutors had probable cause to charge them. The rollout of the new federal enforcement strategy on the border has also faced pushback from several U.S. magistrate judges, who have found the military trespass charges defective. That includes Chief U.S. Magistrate Judge Gregory Wormuth of Las Cruces, who in mid-May began to dismiss such charges in nearly 100 cases where defendants had also been charged with illegal entry, typically a first-time offense. Both De Los Santos-Martinez and Herrera-Juvencio had their military trespass charges dismissed at that time. In El Paso, in the first trial in such a case, a federal court jury on June 5 acquitted a Peruvian woman of the military trespass charges. But this week, an El Paso federal district court judge found an Ecuadorian man guilty of the trespass charge along with illegal entry. Since facing scrutiny over whether migrants are adequately warned they are entering a military defense zone on the border, charging documents give greater detail about where the defendant was caught and note that 1,100 warning signs are posted every 100 to 200 meters in the zone in Spanish and English. In Herrera-Juvencio's case, he had already walked through the defense area before he was captured 1,423 yards north of the international border, court records show. By that time, he was more than three-fourths of a mile from a posted sign, the records show. His criminal complaint states that after his first arrest on May 7, the U.S. Border Patrol provided him with a written notice in Spanish that any unauthorized entry into the restricted military area was prohibited and subject to federal prosecution. De Los Santos-Martinez also received the same notice after his first arrest, records state. Both men also pleaded guilty to re-entry after deportation.
Daily Mirror
a day ago
- Daily Mirror
3,000ft cross-border tunnel used by 'terrorist' cartels discovered
The 3,000ft tunnel included lighting, a fully functional ventilation system and tracks to move contraband across the US-Mexico border amid a crackdown on drug trafficking A huge 3,000ft tunnel used for drug smuggling has been uncovered beneath the US-Mexico border. The "large-scale narcotics smuggling tunnel" linking Tijuana to the San Diego area extended more than 1,000ft inside the US, and described by Border Patrol agents as "highly sophisticated". It included lighting, a fully functional ventilation system and tracks to move contraband, and appears to be the latest attempt by organised criminals to maintain drug trafficking routes amid a tough crackdown at the 1,954-mile border. The US Border Patrol's San Diego Sector Tunnel Team raided the tunnel on Monday after becoming aware of it during its construction. They located the entrance point inside a home in the Nueva Tijuana neighbourhood of Tijuana and alerted Mexican authorities, who served a warrant at the location. Upon arrival, they found a tile had been laid at the entrance in an attempt to hide it from authorities. When officers made it inside the tunnel they encountered a set of "haphazard" barricades erected along the way, designed to prevent them from finding out where it ended up. Border Patrol agents eventually discovered it led to a commercial warehouse in Otay Mesa, California. The tunnel, which went about 50ft underground at its deepest point and was 2,918ft long, is now set for "immediate remediation" by the US Border Patrol. Contractors have been instructed to fill it in with thousands of gallons of concrete to prevent its use by what the US government describes as "Foreign Terrorist Organisations". Jeffrey D. Stalnaker, Acting Chief Patrol Agent of the Border Patrol's San Diego Sector, said: "As we continue to strengthen the nation's air, and maritime border security, it's not surprising that foreign terrorist organisations would resort to underground routes. "Disruption of narcotics smuggling tunnels is critical to protecting American lives. "I'm grateful for the exceptional work of the Tunnel Team agents who placed themselves in danger, as well as the cooperation of our Mexican law enforcement partners." The tunnel raid forms part of a hardline border and immigration policy encouraged by Donald Trump's White House, with the US president having signed an executive order just hours into his second term ordering a stop to the "invasion of the United States through the southern border". Yesterday, Trump ordered Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to resume raids on farms and hotels after employers complained that the "invasive" operations disrupting the industry and scaring off foreign-born workers. Tricia McLaughlin, the Department of Homeland Security assistant secretary, said: "The president has been incredibly clear. There will be no safe spaces for industries who harbour violent criminals or purposely try to undermine Ice's efforts."
New York Post
2 days ago
- New York Post
Border Patrol agents shut down massive drug smuggling tunnel between Tijuana and San Diego
US Border Patrol agents recently discovered and disabled a nearly 3,000-foot-long narcotics smuggling tunnel sitting beneath the US-Mexico border. Agents found the tunnel — which linked Tijuana and San Diego — in early April while it was actively under construction. Advertisement The underground passageway ran under part of the Otay Mesa Port of Entry and had a projected exit point near or inside a commercial warehouse space in San Diego, according to an announcement from US Customs and Border Protection. Upon entering the 'highly sophisticated' tunnel, authorities were met with barricades seemingly placed to prevent law enforcement from finding its entrance, the announcement noted. The tunnel — which reached depths of around 50 feet underground at its deepest point — measured 2,918 feet long, 42 inches tall and 28 inches wide It was equipped with lighting, electrical wiring, ventilation systems and a track system for transporting large amounts of contraband. Advertisement 5 Agents found the tunnel — which linked Tijuana and San Diego — in early April while it was actively under construction. U.S. Customs and Border Protection 5 The tunnel — which reached depths of around 50 feet underground at its deepest point — measured 2,918 feet long, 42 inches tall and 28 inches wide U.S. Customs and Border Protection Border Patrol agents — working alongside Homeland Security Investigations and Government of Mexico authorities — found the entrance point to the tunnel on Monday inside a house in the Nueva Tijuana neighborhood in Tijuana. The entrance had recently been covered up with freshly laid tile, according to the announcement. Advertisement Thousands of gallons of concrete will soon be poured into the tunnel to prevent it from being used by Foreign Terrorist Organizations, US Customs and Border Protection noted. 'As we continue to strengthen the nation's air and maritime border security, it's not surprising that foreign terrorist organizations would resort to underground routes,' Jeffrey D. Stalnaker, acting chief patrol agent of the San Diego Sector, said in a statement. 'Disruption of narcotics smuggling tunnels is critical to protecting American lives.' 5 Border Patrol Agents look out at the construction of an elevated highway being built in Tijuana, Mexico, across from the US border on June 10, 2025. AP 5 American military officials install concertina wire on top of the border wall running along the US-Mexico border between San Diego and Tijuana on April 23, 2025. AFP via Getty Images Advertisement 5 San Diego, USA and Tijuana, Mexico is separated by the border wall on May 8, 2025. Joe Rondone/The Republic / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images More than 95 tunnels have been decommissioned in the San Diego area since 1993. US Customs and Border Protection did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital's request for comment.
AsiaOne
2 days ago
- Politics
- AsiaOne
Soldiers, Strykers and 100-degree temps: Inside Trump's border military zone, World News
SANTA TERESA, NM — The weapons system atop a drab green US Army Stryker swivels, its camera shifting downward toward a white Ford F-150 driving slowly along the US-Mexico border. Under the watchful eye of the 26-ton armoured vehicle perched on a sand dune above them, humanitarian volunteers are driving the dirt road next to the border wall to see if they can continue to search for migrant remains inside one of two military zones established along the border by the Trump administration in April and May. Soon, they get their answer. It's not long before an unmarked gray pickup appears, makes a U-turn in the sand, and puts on its siren, here in the desert 5.6 miles (9km) west of the Santa Teresa, New Mexico border crossing. The driver pulls alongside, introduces himself as a US Border Patrol agent, and tells the volunteers they can no longer be there. James Holman, founder of the Battalion Search and Rescue group, whose volunteers also hand water to migrants through the bars of the barrier, acquiesces. Then he vents his frustration. "We're ramping up all this military and taking this public land away, it doesn't make sense, and it's theatre, it's deadly, deadly theatre," says Holman, 59, a former Marine, who is concerned the military zone will push migrants west into even more dangerous desert crossings. They are in one of two so-called "National Defence Areas" set up along 260 miles (418 km) of the US southern border in New Mexico and Texas as part of the Trump administration's military buildup on the border. US President Donald Trump has long shown interest in using the military for civilian law enforcement, sending Marines to Los Angeles this week in their first domestic deployment in over 30 years. The border military zones are one of his most audacious attempts yet to use troops trained for overseas combat in roles normally carried out by Border Patrol or local police. The Army has not made public the zones' boundaries. The New Mexico area may run over three miles into the United States, in places, based on "restricted area" warning signs in English and Spanish posted along State Road 9 parallel to the border. The zones are classified as US Army installations, giving troops the right to temporarily detain and question migrants and other civilian trespassers caught in the areas. Their primary mission is to detect and track illegal border crossers as part of the Trump administration's quest for "100 per cent operational control" of the border at a time when migrant arrests are near an historic low. Along the international boundary, Reuters saw warning signs posted inside the United States around 45 feet north of the border barrier around every 100 metres, facing south. That meant if you had crossed the border and could read them, you were already in the zone. Migrants caught illegally crossing the border into the zones face new trespassing charges on top of unlawful entry to the country, with combined penalties of up to 10 years imprisonment. Attempts to prosecute them for trespassing have floundered. Starting in May, federal judges in Texas and New Mexico have dismissed trespassing charges against migrants caught within the area and acquitted a Peruvian woman brought to trial, ruling there was no evidence they saw signs before entering the zone. Illegal border crossings fell to a record low in March after the Biden administration shut down asylum claims in 2024 and Mexico tightened immigration controls. Trump, who banned people from claiming asylum on the southern border shortly after starting his second term in January, nonetheless says the military areas are needed to repel an "invasion" of human traffickers and drug smugglers. Border buildup In the past four months Trump raised the number of active-duty troops on the border to 8,000 from 2,500 at the end of the Biden administration, according to the US Army. Presidents since Richard Nixon have used regular troops and reservists for support roles on the border. Trump has taken it a step further. The Bureau of Land Management in April transferred 110,000 acres of land in New Mexico, an area seven times the size of Manhattan, to the US Army for three years to establish a first zone. A second was created in May with a transfer of International Boundary and Water Commission land in Texas. The areas are satellites of the Fort Huachuca and Fort Bliss Army bases in Arizona and Texas, respectively. That gives troops the right to hold and question civilian trespassers without the need for Trump to invoke the Insurrection Act. The law lets a president deploy federal forces domestically during events like civil unrest. Some 105 Stryker combat vehicles and around 2,400 troops from the 4th Infantry Division deployed from Colorado Springs in March. They rove in armoured personnel carriers across New Mexico, Texas and Arizona. Reuters saw Strykers concentrated in a roughly 20-mile ribbon from El Paso west to Santa Teresa, one of the 2,000-mile border's busiest and most deadly areas for migrant crossings. The 8-wheeled vehicles, used by Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan, and now by Ukraine in its war with Russia, can be seen parked under a bridge to Mexico, atop a landfill and on a ridge above a gap in the border wall. Their engines run 24/7 to cool crews in the 100 °F (38 °C) plus heat. Vehicles are unarmed but soldiers have personal weapons. Crews take shifts operating the joystick-controlled camera systems that can see for two miles (3.2 km) and have night vision, according to the Army. A person familiar with Strykers, who asked not to be named, said the work was "monotonous" but said it gave soldiers "a sense of purpose." Troops have alerted Border Patrol to 390 illegal crossings in the nearly two months since the first zone was established. They made their first detentions on June 3, holding 3 "illegal aliens" in New Mexico before handing them over to Border Patrol, according to Army spokesperson Geoffrey Carmichael. Border Patrol arrested 39,677 migrants in the El Paso sector in the fiscal year to April, down 78 per cent from the year-earlier period. 'Covered by desert sand' Sitting outside his juice bar in Sunland Park, Harold Gregory says he has seen a sharp drop in migrants entering his store or asking customers for a ride since Strykers arrived. "We feel safer," said Gregory, 38. "They do kind of like intimidate so there's not so many people come this way." In neighbouring Santa Teresa, trade consultant Jerry Pacheco says the optics of combat vehicles are not good as he tries to draw international firms to the town's industrial park. "It's like killing an ant with a sledgehammer," says Pacheco, executive director of the International Business Accelerator, a nonprofit trade counselling programme. "I think having the military down here is more of a political splash." About 90 miles (143 km) west, New Mexico rancher Russell Johnson said he saw five Strykers briefly positioned in a gap in the border barrier on his ranch. [[nid:719122]] He welcomes the zone as an extra layer of security and has testified to the US Congress on illegal border crossers destroying barbed wire fences, cattle thieves driving livestock into Mexico and a pickup stolen at gunpoint by drug smugglers. He is unsure if his home, or over half his ranch, is inside the area but has been assured by US Border Patrol he can continue to work land ranched by his family since 1918. "I don't know, I don't think anyone knows," says Johnson, 37, a former Border Patrol agent, of the zone's boundaries. He says the Army has not communicated rules for hunters with permits to shoot quail and mule deer this fall in the military area, or hikers who start or end the 3,000-mile (4,800km) Continental Divide Trail within it. The Army has been seeking memoranda of understanding with local communities and agencies to continue activities in the New Mexico zone, said Nicole Wieman, a US Army spokesperson. "The MOU process for commercial and recreational activities, such as hunting, mining and ranching, is complex," Wieman said. Jenifer Jones, Republican state representative for Johnson's area, said Americans can keep doing what they did before in the zone. "They can carry their firearms as they would have prior," said Jones, who welcomed the troops to her "neglected" area where only a barbed-wire fence separates the two countries in places. To the east in Las Cruces, the state's second largest city, State Representative Sarah Silva, a Democrat, said the zones have created fear and apprehension "I see this as an occupation of the US Army on our lands," said Silva. Back in desert west of Santa Teresa, Battalion Search and Rescue leader Abbey Carpenter, 67, stands among dunes where the group has discovered the remains of 24 migrants in 18 months, mostly women. She is concerned the area could be absorbed into the military zone. "Who's going to look for these remains if we're not allowed out here," she said, showing the jaw and other uncollected bones of a woman her group reported to local authorities in September. "Will they just be covered up by the desert sands?" [[nid:719147]]
Daily Mirror
11-06-2025
- Daily Mirror
Heart-pounding moment killer cop who escaped jail finally caught in forest
Grant Hardin, who worked for a time as a police chief in the Arkansas town of Gateway, was serving 30 years in prison for a 2017 fatal shooting, and another 50 years for a 1997 rape The heart-pounding moment the"Devil of the Ozarks" was finally captured in the forest of Arkansas was caught in dramatic photographs. The convicted murderer and rapist was tracked down around a mile away from the prison he had escaped from two weeks ago by US Border Patrol agents. Grant Hardin, who once worked as a police chief, was serving 80 years for murder and rape at the North Central Unit prison on May 25 when he slipped away by impersonating a prison officer. His escape sparked a huge manhunt as he evaded authorities by burrowing deep into the rugged terrain. New images show US Border Patrol Special Operations Group officers restraining Hardin - who could be seen laying shirtless, face down on the forest floor, with his arms tied behind his back with a ligature. US Border Patrol released the photos accompanied with the caption: "One Fugitive. ZERO CHANCE." Hardin - whose infamy earned him publicity through the Devil In The Ozarks documentary - briefly tried to run as he was approached by officers, but they quickly tackled him to the ground and restrained him. Arkansas prison system spokesperson Rand Champion said: "He'd been on the run for a week and a half and probably didn't have any energy left in him." It took two weeks for an enormous search crew - comprised of rifle-wielding officers, helicopters, drone and dog units - to comb the enormous forest and find the man, who many feared could strike again. According to NBC news Hardin walked out the North Central Unit just before 3pm after he disguised himself in a "makeshift" law enforcement uniform. An affidavit stated that he "impersonated a corrections officer in dress and manner, causing a corrections officer operating a secure gate to open the gate." Hardin pleaded guilty in 2017 to first-degree murder for the killing of James Appleton, 59. Appleton worked for the Gateway water department when he was shot in the head Feb. 23, 2017, near Garfield. Police found Appleton's body inside a car. Hardin was sentenced to 30 years in prison. Hardin's DNA was also matched to the 1997 rape of a teacher at an elementary school in Rogers, north of Fayetteville. He was sentenced to 50 years for that crime. Cheryl Tillman, Appleton's sister, was with her mother and sister at a flea market in Ozark, Missouri, when law enforcement called to tell her Hardin had been captured. Tillman is also the mayor of Gateway, the 450-person town where Hardin was briefly police chief.
