Weigh the Risk of Chasing Border Crossers
When the U.S. Border Patrol closely follows a heavily overloaded pickup truck for several miles at high speed on a winding back road, to say that the agents “tailed” rather than “chased” the vehicle simply because no pursuit lights or sirens were turned on is a distinction without a difference.
Just ask the survivors of the April 6 crash near Temecula that left eight passengers dead and 12 badly hurt, one of them paralyzed. The survivors say they pleaded with the driver to stop and frantically signaled the agents in the two pursuit vehicles--at times only 30 feet away--to back off as the pickup careened around curves at 60-plus mph.
It will be interesting to hear what the survivors have to say about Friday’s incident east of San Diego, in which a van that a Border Patrol agent tried to “pull over” crashed, killing two and injuring the other 22 people inside.
Yes, smugglers take terrible chances with their human cargo and should be prosecuted to the hilt. But these fatal crashes call for more than the usual railing against “merchants of death.”
Given the increased number of immigration checkpoints and the increasingly desperate attempts to circumvent them, we need to reflect on Border Patrol policy and whether the agents stuck heedlessly to the chase. What the agents’ own handbook says about high-speed pursuits is a good starting point. At least in writing, the Border Patrol’s parent agency, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, makes the safety of would-be immigrants an overriding consideration. Agents are told to drop pursuits rather than risk human lives--their own, or the border crossers’ or bystanders’.
This policy shows a sense of proportion. After all, we are not talking about aggravated felons here. The people the Border Patrol catches day in and day out are typically men who just want to earn a living wage and women and children who just want to reunite with husbands and fathers.
The logic of the INS policy applies equally well to foot chases. Unfortunately, it has been disregarded there as well, with equally fatal consequences. One night this past January, six men fleeing the Border Patrol ran off a 120-foot cliff near Chula Vista after being tailed to within feet of the edge. A Border Patrol spokesman said it was “unfortunate” that the men ran in the wrong direction. One of the six died; another ended up comatose.
In that case, as in the case of the Temecula crash, the Border Patrol was quick to put the entire blame on the smugglers, who supposedly guided the six men into the canyon area near the Otay Lakes dam. The question of whether the agents’ desire to make the most of their tactical advantage might have won out over good sense went unanswered. Sad experience moves us to ask again now.
Ten years ago, California Rural Legal Assistance joined forces with then-Bishop Roger Mahony of Stockton in denouncing the Border Patrol’s practice of rounding up illegal alien farm workers in the fields by herding them toward irrigation ditches. Before our appeals for restraint changed the way such sweeps were carried out in the Central Valley, a dozen farm-workers made panicked efforts to escape into the deep, fast-running waters and drowned.
Should the Border Patrol ignore renewed appeals to weigh with more care the human costs of these very dangerous pursuits, the consequences will be appalling. A lot more immigrants will die unnecessarily. But the immigration debate has gotten so poisonous that to propose a more measured approach to pursuits is to be branded an advocate of open borders.
Like so many aspects of Border Patrol wrongdoing, the problem with chases is not so much with policy, although the Border Patrol handbook’s vague phrasing cries for amplification of what conditions justify chases. The larger problem is the Border Patrol’s widespread tolerance for practices that violate INS regulations, a state of mind no doubt reinforced by the current barrage of anti-immigration vitriol.
Of course, stepped-up border interdiction diverts attention from what would be a real deterrent to illegal immigration: getting tough with some of our key industries, like tourism and agribusiness, that reap big benefits from the labor of unauthorized workers. But these industries have plenty of clout, so politicians are unwilling to deal head-on with the magnet--the promise of employment--that draws people to cross the border. Meanwhile, illegal immigration will continue to be another awful accident waiting to happen--and not just to the border crossers.
