Browsing by Subject "Border Patrol"

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Migrant Deaths and Search and Rescue Efforts in Brooks County
(LBJ School of Public Affairs, 2024-04) Leutert, Stephanie
For more than 140 years, migrants have died along the United States and Mexico’s nearly 2,000- mile-long border. Currently, the state of Texas—which makes up two-thirds of the border—is the deadliest stretch for migrants in transit.1 While migrants may die from various causes within Texas, the state’s interior, composed of vast and rugged Texas brush, is particularly deadly. Every year, thousands of migrants trek through this challenging landscape as they attempt to circumvent Border Patrol checkpoints that are located on north-bound highways. However, many individuals never make it through. Within the Texas interior, more migrants die in Brooks County—which begins more than 50 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border—than anywhere else. The county is home to the Border Patrol’s Falfurrias checkpoint, and migrants who attempt to circumvent it by walking through private ranchland face life-threatening risks, such as dehydration and exposure to the heat and cold. Since 2009, the Brooks County Sheriff’s Office has recovered nearly 1,000 migrant remains in this terrain. Yet these are only the discovered remains, with officials estimating that only one in five migrant decedents are ever found. The Brooks County Sheriff’s Office is the primary law enforcement agency in the county. Sheriff’s Office personnel undertake standard law enforcement duties and are also responsible for engaging in migrant search and rescue efforts and recovering remains. Yet the Sheriff’s Office faces significant constraints, including limited funding, equipment, and personnel. As of March 2024, the Sheriff’s Office had just five paid patrol officers and one volunteer deputy to cover the county’s nearly 950 square miles. This report was prepared for the Brooks County Sheriff’s Office, and is divided into four chapters. The first chapter reviews the history of migrant deaths in South Texas, beginning in the late nineteenth century. The second chapter maps out current migrant death dynamics in Brooks County. The third chapter discusses the various actors in Brooks County who engage in migrant search and rescue efforts and recover migrant remains, and how the Sheriff’s Office fits into these broader efforts. Finally, the fourth chapter offers recommendations for how the Brooks County Sheriff’s Office could build out their migrant search and rescue initiatives.