Some very determined coyotes

A coyote is slang for human smuggler. If you want to sneak into the United States, you find a coyote, pay him some money, and he arranges the excursion. Sometimes they are called polleros (AKA chicken herders). The price tag used to be about $1,000 but the price has gone up due to heightened security.

Now, this is a highly illegal business and these guides are not always your church-going types. It is common for them to leave injured people in the desert to die. Sometimes they rape their customers. A common trick is to escort people into the United States, hold them hostage in a drop house, and extort additional money from them to finish the job.

For example, they’ll hold you in a house in Tucson and you have to call your cousin in Chicago to send another $1,500 so they will take you the rest of the way. If you don’t, they threaten to kill you or turn you in to Immigration.

So, this particular case caught my eye.

There were 33 Cuban illegal aliens and four Central American illegals picked up along the Mexican coast near Cancun. Mexican Immigration Agents were transporting them by bus somewhere in Chiapas when the bus was stopped by armed men. The Immigration Agents were ordered off the bus and the Cuban illegals and their coyotes drove away.

Well, 18 of those same illegals walked across the bridge into Hidalgo Texas a few days later and turned themselves in to US authorities. They will be allowed to stay because our laws allow Cubans who reach land to remain here legally.

Those hapless suckers who are caught in a boat are denied entry and sent home. The game (I mean POLICY) is called “wet foot, dry foot”.

So, these smugglers were not about to let Mexico keep their customers. They went after them with guns and didn’t stop until the job was finished.

Of course, these Cuban aliens paid $15,000 each to the mafia to get them into the United States.

And more are choosing the Mexico route all the time. Mexican Immigration Police estimate that they will stop 2,000 such attempts this year. Who knows how many enter through Mexico undetected.