Escaped inmate found in surge of crossings near El Paso
NEW YORK (FOX 5 NY) - Border Patrol agents took hundreds of people in several large groups into custody in a single 24 hour period in Texas.
Among them were two previously deported sex offenders, a 2-year-old toddler who was traveling without any parents, and a self-proclaimed prison gang member who was wanted on a federal warrant for escape.
U.S. Border Patrol agents say the groups were comprised primarily of Central American families and unaccompanied juveniles.
Agents apprehended a group of 112 illegal aliens at the border wall near downtown El Paso just after midnight Wednesday. At about the same time agents working further east were processing a group of 252 aliens apprehended at the border just west of a high school.
Throughout the morning hours several smaller groups also arrived at multiple locations along the border in the El Paso metropolitan area.
In just a few hours the total number taken into custody exceeded 500. An unaccompanied 2-year-old child was found among one of the groups. The U. S. Border Patrol said it was working with international and domestic agencies in order to locate the parents.
Border Patrol Agents also arrested two convicted sex offenders attempting to enter illegally. Both sex offenders were arrested in different groups attempting to enter the U.S. illegally evading Border Patrol agents. Both had served time in jail before being deported.
Agents in far-east El Paso County also arrested a group of six. One of them was a 28-year-old U.S. citizen with a lengthy criminal record who was found to have an outstanding federal warrant for escape. He was handed over to the U.S. Marshals Service. The other five, who were not U.S. citizens, were being processed.
Tuesday Customs and Border Protection released data detailing the record number of apprehensions of inadmissible family units border wide. The data showed the greatest increase in the El Paso Sector where family groups are up 1,689% when compared to same period last year.