Two gang members and a migrant with a child sex offense conviction were apprehended by Border Patrol agents in the Rio Grande Valley Sector as part of different groups of migrants entering the US, the government agency reported.
Agents detained a Salvadoran national and registered sex offender on Wednesday. He had previously been jailed in Texas in 2018 for indecency with a child by sexual conduct. He was found guilty but not deported, instead of receiving a five-year probationary sentence.
He was caught for stalking and child abuse in Houston a year later, and this time he was deported. He also has a warrant out for his arrest. According to a press release, he was traveling with a 7-year-old child and her mother.
Meanwhile, agents in La Joya came upon a group of six migrants attempting to avoid them on Tuesday. During the investigation, they discovered that one of the women, 22, was a member of the 18th Street gang who had been removed many times, even as recently as August.
Then, on the same day, three Salvadorans, including a 28-year-old member of the MS-13 gang, were apprehended in McAllen. The gang member has also been deported previously, according to the release.
Several sex offenders were apprehended by agents throughout the past holiday season. Officials reported this week that they had detained an Ecuadorian national from Atlanta, Georgia, who had previously been convicted of aggravated sodomy, child molestation, and rape. He was sentenced to 12 years in prison for the crimes. Moreover, on the weekend, two sex offenders, even a US-registered one, were caught along with a gang member.
Most of them have already been caught in the US on several occasions while trying to stay in the country over the past 9 months. Each time they were deported, but they found ways to return.
According to the same CBP data, 110 gang members have been captured at the border in FY2022. In FY2021, 348 gang members were detained, down from 363 in FY2020 and dramatically lower than the 976 caught in FY2019, prompting some Republicans to worry that they are sliding past an overburdened Border Patrol.
The crime rate in the border areas is also a matter of concern for local residents and lawmakers worried about the congestion of border agents, especially given the fact that the number of detained non-citizens with a criminal record in the United States increased almost fivefold in a year-to-year comparison of 2020-2021.