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Agent shares information on Border Patrol
Posted: Monday, Aug 25, 2008 - 08:47:28 am CDT
by Heidi Hood - Staff writer
Early on a recent Tuesday morning, Field Operations Supervisor Sean Kraemer stood in front of a room full of new Border Patrol agents and presented a series of slides titled US Border Patrol, Planning Principles; Why We Do What We Do.
The new agents, fresh out of the academy, watched and listened as Kraemer explained the importance of the Border Patrol and took steps to try to explain the vastly complicated business that is their job.
It is these complications that Kraemer wanted to visit about after the presentation was over and the new agents were dismissed to their duties.
We're like the Marines for law enforcement, he described the Border Patrol. The grunts.
Grunts they might be, but they are grunts that last year made 876,700 arrests and prevented over 2 million pounds of drugs from being circulated in the United States. Out of the arrests, 144,000 individuals had been in the U.S. previously and had a criminal history. And then there were 18,942 major crime offenders: 304 for homicide, 134 for kidnapping, 465 for sexual assault, 5,492 for aggravated assault, 841 for robbery and 11,706 who were in possession of dangerous drugs.
Kraemer calls these statistics the situation. The situation is the reason why he wanted to visit about what the Border Patrol is and does.
People don't realize, don't know, he said.
To understand what an agent does, Kraemer explained, people need to have some background information about the agency.
Here in Uvalde, the green uniform of a Border Patrol agent is not an unfamiliar sight. In their green and white vehicles, at the Highway 90 checkpoint or stopping a train in Knippa, the agents out of the Uvalde station are recognized.
However, even though you probably know someone that is an agent, or know someone who knows someone that is an agent, the greater picture behind the green uniforms is, well, a little bigger.
For instance, there are 120 agents that are employed through the Uvalde station. Last year, the Uvalde station seized over $10,058,828 in drugs and agents arrested 2,148 illegal immigrants and smugglers. At any given time a handful of those agents are in Arizona, the front line of the Border Patrol world, or at the training facility, otherwise known as the academy, in Artesia, N.M., working as instructors.
And the Uvalde station is growing.
In the future, Kraemer said, Uvalde will be welcoming a tide of new agents. Step one is a new facility for which ground was recently broken. The new facility will be next door to the current facility at the Uvalde Industrial Park next to the airport. No completion date has been set, though Kraemer said they have gotten a bit of a late start on the project, which was supposed to begin several months ago.
In addition to the new facility in Uvalde, a new checkpoint on Highway 90 is also in the works. This facility will be an all-weather facility that will be manned pretty much around the clock.
It'll never shut down, basically, Kraemer said.
Kraemer said Uvalde agents' duties range from stopping trains, as mentioned, to patrolling Highway 481 where a great number of illegal immigrants are picked up walking the highway after passing through the brush country at night.
Picking up illegal immigrants is, of course, a large part of what a Border Patrol agent does. While talking about illegal immigrants, Kraemer said one of the things that most angers him about the public, and mentioning Hollywood's perception of the Border Patrol in particular, is their questioning of whether or not the Border Patrol is humane in their treatment of illegal immigrants.
He explained that people comment on how the smugglers are just trying to help their fellow citizens gain a better life, but that it is folly to think like that.
They are only in it for the money, he said of the smugglers. He explained that in 1999 it would cost $400 for transport from Piedras Negras to San Antonio. Now, illegal immigrants are paying between $1,140 to $2,000 to smugglers to get them across South Texas and to San Antonio, which is a transfer hub.
They don't care, Kraemer said of the smugglers and their attitude toward those they transport. He cited a local case in the past year in which smugglers separated the females from the rest of the party and then raped them. Kraemer also talked of the way smugglers treat children, pulling up one of the slides used for the presentation where a child was stuffed in a piñata.
If there's a long line, they'll die, he said of the smuggling tactic to get the child through Customs at a border crossing.
But, making money on transferring illegal immigrants is not the only crime being committed.
Kraemer said there are a lot of immigrants coming over that are economic refugees and are just looking for a better life but mixed into that group are people with other intents. He explained that amongst the clutter are criminals, drug runners and terrorists.
The 9/11 terrorists came in from Canada, he pointed out.
As for how the Border Patrol is conducting business and the questions surrounding ethics, Kraemer said it is about creating situations where the Border Patrol agent can apprehend those coming across, no matter their intent.
He explained that when the media talks about the Border Patrol forcing immigrants into the desert to die, by creating the fence along the border for instance, he said that is not the Border Patrol's intent. Rather, Kraemer explained that what they are trying to do is force the illegal aliens away from metropolitan areas with built in infrastructures, where the ability to disperse and disappear is at its highest, and further out where it gives agents time to apprehend.
Currently, Kraemer said the focus of the Border Patrol is Arizona, but that all along the borders with Canada and Mexico, the Border Patrol is beefing up its forces due to the mandate from President George W. Bush for 18,000 agents.
Among those 18,000 agents are those that will be transferred to Uvalde to provide support and valuable services within this area less than two hours away from the border.
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