| | |  Americas & Beyond | September 2008 
Illegal Immigrant Feels Safer in the US
 Laura Nesbitt - EMTelegraph
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Angela (not her real name) paid a stranger in Ciudad Juárez $1,200 to escort her and her two brothers to the United States illegally in June 2003.
It took her 22 days to get from El Paso to Estancia.
She waited at the border crossing until she knew immigration officials were not checking passports, then pretended to read a book so she wouldn't look nervous, as immigration officials waved her through the checkpoint.
Angela is 29 years old, speaks only Spanish and has four children, two of whom were born in the United States.
It is difficult to estimate the number of people living in the county, state or country illegally, said Leticia Zamarripa, public affairs officer with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Mexico is among the top five countries whose citizens are being held at the El Paso Processing Center and Otero Detention facility. Both are maintained by ICE, Zamarripa said.
Zamarripa did cite these nationwide statistics: In 2007, the total number of criminal illegal immigrants detained was 5,599 and noncriminal was 9,671. In 2008, the total number of criminal illegal immigrants detained was 6,310, and noncriminal was 7,433. Both criminal and noncriminal immigrants enter the country illegally. Criminal immigrants are also convicted of a crime while here.
"We have a pretty fair number of Mexican nationals in Torrance County, and they live in fear," said Audrey Rodriguez, Torrance County's public health nurse since 1973.
Health officials in Estancia have a sliding fee scale program and never refuse services to clients.
"We don't ask if they are or aren't citizens," Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez said about 80 percent of the clinic's clients speak only Spanish.
Deputy District Attorney Tim Cornish would only comment on the demographics of the county as a private citizen with a unique perspective. Cornish returned to the United States after working with contractors to the U.S. Agency for International Development in Mexico and other Central and South American countries. Cornish speaks Spanish fluently.
"Most (illegal immigrants) are hardworking. You grow up and you don't have a choice. These folks come from a hardworking tradition," Cornish said.
Many are from Chihuahua, like Angela, where there's been a huge economic and cultural shift from farming and ranching toward illegal activities, he said.
"It doesn't mean necessarily that they're (all) fleeing from (drug dealers) taking over. It means that they may have been on the losing end of making a living, whether legal or illegal," Cornish said.
Alfonso Rodriguez translated as Angela talked about why she prefers to live in this country.
"A lot of times, they don't have everything they need, but they live a lot better than they did when they lived in Mexico," Rodriguez translated.
Angela, her husband and her two eldest children once lived in a room with no bathroom and no shower in Colonia Juárez, Chihuahua, Mexico.
In March, narcotics traffickers took control of her town by killing and kidnapping town officials.
"Last June they killed a bunch of people. No one has done anything about it. Not the police nor the government," Rodriguez translated.
According to Angela, the police would be killed if they didn't go along with the traffickers.
"The police are paid by drug traffickers to look away," Rodriguez translated.
Angela says the reason she is here, and plans to stay here for as long as she can, is simple — she feels safer.
"She knows she's living in a place that she doesn't belong. But she's not scared because she hasn't done anything wrong. All immigration authorities would do if they caught them is deport them back to Mexico," Rodriguez translated. |
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