A murder suspect was found among 77 illegal migrants discovered in two stash houses in El Paso, Texas, according to authorities.
In one property border patrol agents discovered 72 people living in overcrowded and unsanitary conditions after receiving a tip-off about a possible stash house in the area, with another other five found in a second property.
U.S. Border Patrol El Paso Sector Anti-Smuggling Units (ASU), Homeland Security Investigations, El Paso Texas Constables, and the Texas Department of Public Safety served a warrant on a property on Overland Avenue.
Upon searching the property, agents found migrants inside a storage shed with poor ventilation, small windows, and surrounded by piles of trash, according to CBP.
A murder suspect was found among 77 migrants discovered in two stash houses in El Paso, Texas, according to authorities.
CBP
Two individuals were identified as caretakers of the illegal stash house and will face human smuggling charges.
Further investigation led to the discovery of a second property on Val Verde Street, where five more migrants were located. In total, 77 migrants from Mexico, Honduras, Ecuador, Guatemala, and the Dominican Republic were found, all in a stable condition.
While conducting records checks at the processing center, authorities identified one of the arrested individuals from the Dominican Republic as being wanted for murder in his home country, according to the International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL) database.
All migrants encountered were processed under Title 8 for removal.
In the Fiscal Year 2024, El Paso Sector human smuggling interdiction teams have discovered over 270 stash houses and apprehended 2,663 migrants.
“The citizens in our local El Paso community provide an important partnership to help us safeguard our city. We encourage anyone with information to report suspicious activity to our office. A phone call could help our agents disrupt criminal smuggling and possibly save lives,” said A. Scott Good, El Paso Sector Chief Patrol Agent.
Upon searching the property, agents found migrants inside a storage shed with poor ventilation, small windows, and surrounded by piles of trash, according to CBP.
CBP
Good also said in a post on X that “smugglers are prioritizing profits over migrant safety”.
Republicans have used migrant crime as an attack line on Democrats and Vice President Kamala Harris in the run-up to the 2024 election.
Newsweek reached out the Harris campaign for comment.
Vice presidential candidate JD Vance has repeated unproven claims that Haitian migrants are eating people’s pets, while former president Donald Trump has previously claimed that migrants are “poisoning the blood of our country.”
“Every day Americans are dying,” Texas Sen. Ted Cruz said at the Republican National Convention. He claimed they are being “murdered, assaulted, and raped by illegal immigrants that the Democrats have released.”
However, immigrants are “significantly less likely” to commit crimes than those born in the United States, according to a study by Northwestern University.
The study, led by economist Elisa Jácome, looked at U.S. Census incarceration data over the 150 years from 1850 to 2020.
“Our study shows that since 1870, it has never been the case that immigrants as a group have been more incarcerated than the U.S.-born,” Jácome said in a statement at the time.
A study by the CATO Institute, a libertarian think tank, looked into Texas in 2019. They discovered that undocumented immigrants were 37.1% less likely to be convicted of a crime.
Do you have a story we should be covering? Do you have any questions about this article? Contact LiveNews@newsweek.com
