Death Waits for Migrants Walking Past Checkpoint : Fatalities: Twelve pedestrians believed to have been illegal aliens have been run down and killed this year in about a 10-mile stretch of Interstate 5 between Las Pulgas Road and the Orange County line.

Ruben Calderon, a farmer from the Mexican state of Guerrero, wanted to visit his four children in Orange County.

Unable to obtain a visa to enter the United States, Calderon, 59, decided to cross illegally via the Tijuana-San Diego border, a route he knew well from his years as an undocumented strawberry picker in California, according to an account provided by his son, Rodolfo Calderon, who now lives in Santa Ana. On this trip, the elder Calderon was accompanied by his wife, Josefina Salgado Uriastegui, 52, who was making her first trip to the north.

On July 28, the couple negotiated the border. Only one obstacle--the U.S. immigration checkpoint north of Oceanside--loomed.

At 10:52 p.m. on July 28, the couple were seen holding hands as they crossed Interstate 5 from east to west just south of the Border Patrol checkpoint, in the midst of heavy weekend traffic. They apparently planned to hike around the inspection area, concealing themselves amid the thick brush that lines the freeway’s western border.

Seconds or less after they were seen holding hands, a 1985 Toyota pickup heading south couldn’t avoid hitting the couple, according to the California Highway Patrol. Both were dead at the scene. Authorities contacted the couple’s children, who were traced by a telephone number of a former employer found on the father’s body.

The couple are among 12 pedestrians, all believed to have been undocumented aliens, run down and killed this year in about a 10-mile stretch of Interstate 5 between Las Pulgas Road and the Orange County line. All apparently were trying to evade agents at the checkpoint, authorities said.

The checkpoint represents the last real barrier for the many undocumented people attempting to go north each day. Once into Orange County, there is little likelihood of detection by U.S. authorities.

Hiking around the bustling checkpoint is a risk-laden maneuver that often requires two hazardous crossings of eight lanes of speeding traffic, usually in the dark. Many of those negotiating the trek are already exhausted, having been up all night traversing the border area and arranging transport to the north.

But why do they cross the dangerous freeway twice?

Smugglers routinely jettison their human cargo on the shoulder and median of northbound Interstate 5 just south of the checkpoint, authorities say.

Many arrange to hook up with the travelers farther north after the smuggling vehicles--frequently driven by legal U.S. residents--have cleared inspection, according to immigration officials.

But the obstacle--the checkpoint itself--also is on the northbound side. In addition, Camp Pendleton’s military police patrol that side.

So many immigrants follow a path across the freeway to the west side and the relative safety of San Onofre State Beach.

The public beach, which takes up most of the strip of land along the southbound side of the freeway, is honeycombed with paths used by migrants on foot seeking to evade inspection.

Campers in large recreational vehicles and high-tech tents often are stunned to see the groups ambling by, heading north, unexpected jolts from the Third World. The railroad tracks that adjoin the beach property are also a popular route, authorities say.

Once past the checkpoint, the migrants head across the freeway again to pick up their northbound rides, braving a strip where more than 100 vehicles speed past each minute.

On a recent Sunday morning, a group of half a dozen undocumented Mexican nationals from the state of Puebla, among them a lame woman, were found hiking north along the railroad tracks next to the San Onofre State Beach.

Two men said they had carried the woman across the freeway after they all had been dropped off on the northbound shoulder by a smuggler.

They were confused about their whereabouts but said they had been unable to find the smuggler anew and were now planning to walk north as far as San Juan Capistrano, about 15 miles ahead.

But soon afterwards, all were arrested by U.S. Border Patrol agents, who regularly make rounds in the state beach and surrounding area.

Earlier that same morning, a man, a woman and the woman’s young daughter, all of whom said they were from Mexico City, had successfully hiked around the checkpoint, led by a male guide who seemed to know every path and tree along the railroad property and adjoining state beach route.

They continued to a point about a mile north of the checkpoint, before stopping to rest beneath a pepper tree and preparing to dash back across the freeway. They declined to speak, other than to say that they were headed to Los Angeles.

Usual Border Patrol policy is not to chase suspects across the hazardous highways, but occasionally agents brave the freeways along with the immigrants.

Early on the morning of Feb. 25, according to a county coroner’s report, Maria de Jesus Hernandez and her two sons, aged 7 and 21, tried to cross Interstate 5 from west to east at a spot just north of the checkpoint. A Border Patrol agent who had been traveling south in his vehicle began a U-turn toward them, according to the coroner’s report.

“The officer yelled to the group to stop, however, they began running across the highway,” the report stated. At 2:25 a.m., at a point 3.6 miles south of the Basilone Road overpass, the mother was struck by a northbound hit-and-run vehicle; she was immediately thrown onto another car that was also heading north. She was dead at the scene.

Ted Swofford, a Border Patrol spokesman, said agents’ reactions depended on a variety of circumstances, among them the amount of traffic and the potential danger to the pedestrians.

“Sometimes making the arrest is the safest option we can choose,” said Swofford, who noted that arresting the pedestrians at least gets them out of the way of traffic.

Sharon Frisby said she and her daughter were returning from a trip to Disneyland shortly after midnight Aug. 8 when, north of the checkpoint along I-5, she felt something hit her 1990 Chevrolet Corsica.

“It’s like a nightmare,” recalled Frisby, 47, who was visiting San Diego on vacation from her home in Mesa, Ariz. “It happened so suddenly, instantly. I saw something white, and he was thrown to the ground. . . . I didn’t see features or anything.”

Her car had struck Constantino Loreto Marin, an 8-year-old Mexican youth from the southern state of Guerrero. He was dead at the scene.

Constantino, his mother and five siblings were crossing the freeway from west to east, having made it around the checkpoint and apparently hoping to catch a ride north.

The family was bound for the home of the mother’s sister in Santa Ana. Constantino was last in line.

His family couldn’t afford a burial, and the body was cremated.

A citizen of Mexico, Antonio Marin-Colon, 24, was charged with felony alien-smuggling linked to the death of the boy. Marin-Colon could face an involuntary manslaughter charge.

In the case of Ruben Calderon and his wife, the children in California paid to ship the remains back for burial in their home town of Teloloapan in southern Mexico.

“They only wanted to come for a two-month visit,” said Rodolfo Calderon. “They just wanted to come see us.”

IMMIGRANT CHECKPOINT 1. Northbound cars carrying immigrants stop before reaching checkpoint when Border Patrol agents appear to be stopping cars. 2. To avoid detection by checkpoint agents immigrants cross the freeway lanes of the I-5 and walk north near the beach. Twelve immigrants have been killed so far this year trying to cross the freeway. 3. Immigrants cross the I-5 again north of the checkpoint station and get picked up by same car that dropped them off.