Victim Remains Unidentified in Freeway Death

Authorities have been unable to identify a man who was killed Sunday crossing the freeway near the immigration checkpoint south of San Clemente, the first traffic fatality there in two years.

The victim was struck while crossing Interstate 5, apparently while running with another man who suffered only minor injuries, according to the California Highway Patrol.

The second man, Miguel Pano, 28, also was hit by a car. Pano, who has been released from Samaritan Medical Center in San Clemente, said Monday he fears the man killed was his brother-in-law, Senaido Garcia, 24.

But Pano said authorities never asked him to identify the dead man, and now Pano is returning to his native Mexico without his brother-in-law and without knowing whether he was the person killed.

Pano said he and three others had been passengers in a car heading north on the freeway toward the Border Patrol checkpoint. He said the car’s driver told the four passengers to get out when the driver saw the checkpoint was in operation.

The accident occurred in an area where such fatalities were common before 1993. That’s when a 7-mile-long, 8-foot-high fence was built along the median that runs north from Las Pulgas Road to the checkpoint. Authorities also posted signs warning motorists to take care along the stretch of highway that was frequently crossed by undocumented immigrants seeking to avoid capture.

In 1990, 15 people were killed as they attempted to dash across the freeway.

Despite the effort to deter people from crossing the highway on foot, CHP officials say fear and lack of education contribute to people scaling the fence.

“Education is the key thing,” CHP spokesman Ted Prola said. “People who emigrate from other countries sometimes are not familiar with some of the rules and procedures of this country.”

Pano and Garcia, natives of Guerrero, Mexico, were headed to New York to find better-paying jobs, Pano said while recovering from his injuries at the medical center.

Pano had worked as a taquero, or cook who specializes in making tacos in an Acapulco hotel. Garcia had shined shoes for a living.

Both left their wives and children behind and made their way through Mexico on bus. In Tijuana, they met a driver and two other men for the trip across the border, according to Pano.

As the group approached the immigration checkpoint at 6:50 p.m., Pano said, the driver stopped and told the passengers to make a run for it across the freeway.

According to Pano, the four men climbed over the fence, with the first two making it across. When Pano climbed down the fence, he was struck by a car but managed to crawl to a shoulder.

Pano said he did not see Garcia, who was behind him scaling the fence, get struck.

A few hours later, fearful, hungry and in pain, Pano dragged himself out of shrubbery to the edge of the freeway and waved down a CHP officer. Pano was treated for a dislocated shoulder and broken shinbone, a hospital spokesman said. At the hospital, Pano said CHP officials told him an unidentified man had been killed but he was not asked if he knew the man.

Prola said Monday that Pano told the CHP he did not know who the victim was.

The San Diego County coroner will store the body until an identification can be made.

Monday afternoon, Pano prepared to leave for Tijuana, where he said he would contact a relative and call his wife--Garcia’s sister.

“I will never come back to the United States or leave Acapulco again,” said Pano, emotion cracking his voice. “Because, this is what we get for it. Here we only come to find death.”