A migrant was shot and killed in the Mexican-Texas border by an agent of the U.S. border patrol, according to the U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
During 1:30 p.m. (ET) on this past Wednesday, the agent was given a report notifying of “illegal activity” on a channel near Rio Bravo, in the Webb County. When he got to the indicated place, he spotted a group of migrants. The agency has notified that the agent “came under attack by multiple subjects” as he attempted to approach the group. After firing “at least one round”, the man shot and killed one of them and arrested three individuals that were considered as “illegal aliens”. Neither the officer or the victim have been identified.
KGNS-TV of Laredo, associate of NBC, has reported that Marta Martinez, a woman who lives nearby the location where the encounter took place, started live-streaming the events on Facebook after hearing the gunshots and identified the victim to be a young woman. In the video, Martinez can be seen explaining to her family what just happened, confronting the agent while he arrests two men and indicating others to where the events had occurred. The woman proceeds to comment on the fact that the agent said he was using teasers, although his statements are not present in the live-stream. She told KGNS that “[migrants] come here to the United States to live the American dream. So there’s no American dream right there. She died right there on the scene”. According to Customs and Border Protection, The FBI and Texas Rangers are still investigating and searching the scene, with a news conference scheduled for Friday.
This events come after increasing tensions between immigrants, Border Patrol agents and the U.S. administration. In a May 17th speech at the White House, President Donald Trump responded to a reporter, while referring to the MS-13 gang members, that “You wouldn’t believe how bad these people are. These aren’t people, these are animals”, adding that the U.S. has “the dumbest laws on immigration in the world”. The statement was quite controversial, especially after the president’s new policy that would increase the number of children separated from their families when crossing the border together. Trump told Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen that “those are the bad laws that the Democrats gave us. We have to break up families … because of the Democrats. It’s terrible”.
Earlier this month, another border patrol agent was reported to have detained and interrogated two women after overhearing them speaking Spanish to each other, both of them being U.S. citizens. The events were recorded by one of the women, from Montana, as she was being questioned by the agent. Ana Suda and Mimi Hernandez were shopping for groceries at a gas station while chatting in Spanish. Suda told to NBC that the agent asked where they were born and for their identifications. After going to the station’s parking lot, she started recording the incident, where the agent can be seen stating: “Ma’am, the reason I asked you for your ID is because I came in here, and I saw that you guys are speaking Spanish, which is very unheard of up here”. The agent denied the fact that he had stopped women because of racial profiling, and they were able to go after thirty minutes of questioning.
According to the Customs and Border Protection office, border patrol agents have been in 996 use-of-force cases in the 2017 fiscal year, with most of them executed with a “Less-Lethal Device and Other Less-Lethal Force”. The number, however, is the highest it has been since 2014, and the third highest in the past six years.
Featured Image via Wikimedia Commons
