In a rural Texas county, an increasing number of illegal immigrants are dying before they can complete the journey to what they hoped would be a better life

MISSION, Texas -- In the freezer of a small funeral home nearly 13 miles from the Texas-Mexico border, 22 bodies are stacked on plywood shelves, one on top of the other.

The bodies wrapped in white sheets have names, families and official countries of origin -- Honduras, El Salvador, Mexico, sometimes China or Pakistan. The bodies in black shrouds are the remains of the nameless and unclaimed, waiting to be identified.

For the past few years, the family-owned Elizondo Mortuary and Cremation Service in Mission, Texas, has been taking in the remains of undocumented immigrants found dead in nearby counties after crossing the border from Mexico. This year, however, they had to build an extra freezer. It’s become difficult to keep up with the rising tide of dead coming to them from across the Rio Grande Valley.

Crossing the U.S.-Mexico border illegally has always been dangerous, but this year heat and drought have made the journey particularly deadly. According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, this part of the border has seen a sharp rise in both rescues and deaths of people crossing the border illegally. So far in 2012, agents have rescued more than 310 people, and found nearly 150 dead in the Rio Grande Valley -- an increase of more than 200 percent over the last fiscal year.

This comes as migration across the U.S.-Mexico border has dropped to historic lows, falling nearly 62 percent over the last five years, according to numbers recently released by CBP. But the proportion of deaths to apprehensions is rising -- suggesting that while fewer are crossing, more are dying.

Ground zero is over 70 miles north of the border, in Brooks County. Last year the remains of about 50 presumed undocumented immigrants were found in the county. This year, the tally has reached about 104, with nearly three months to go.

The rising number of unclaimed corpses marks a growing crisis for this cash-strapped county of fewer than 7,500 residents. Because Brooks has no coroner, it sends the bodies recovered on its vast cattle ranches to Elizondo in neighboring Hidalgo County. It costs, according to county officials, about $1,500 for each body to be processed.

Both the county and Elizondo also make efforts to identify the remains. In most cases, chances are slim. The mortuary uses physical descriptions and accounts of the clothing worn by missing immigrants to attempt to match bodies, but often there are few clues to work with. The elements and animals often destroy corpses and scatter bones across the desert. While DNA testing could help, neither Brooks County nor Elizondo can afford to order the tests for every unidentified body.

Many of the migrants who are found dead in this part of South Texas end up buried in paupers’ graves, remembered only by their gender, case number and the name of the ranch where they died.

In September, Marta Iraheta traveled from Houston to Falfurrias, Texas, the seat of Brooks County. She came seeking the remains of her nephew and a friend who disappeared in July as they crossed illegally into the United States.

Twenty-year-old Elmer Esau Barahona left his hometown of San Vicente, El Salvador, on June 10th. On June 27th -- his is daughter’s second birthday -- he called his mother to say he had arrived in the border city of McAllen, Texas.

He told her he and his friend were staying in a stash house, waiting for the smugglers to take them on the next leg of the journey. From the stories Iraheta has pieced together from survivors, her nephew and his friend left McAllen five days later, on the evening of July 2.

Tuesday 9 October 2010

http://openchannel.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/10/09/14300178-deadly-crossing-death-toll-rises-among-those-desperate-for-the-american-dream?lite

‘Angels’ search for migrants’ bodies

FALFURRIAS — Miles and miles of brush filled with hidden dangers, dehydration and high temperatures line the road awaiting many undocumented immigrants who try to circumvent U.S. Border Patrol checkpoints in Falfurrias and Sarita.

The trek has led many of those migrants to graves that line the municipal cemetery in Falfurrias.Small metal plaques that read “unknown male remains” or “unknown female remains” mark the end of the journey for many immigrants and leave their families back home with questions about their fate.

“The bodies here are just the ones that have been found and most of the time they are found only by accident,” said Rafael Hernandez, the director of Angeles Del Desierto, a nonprofit that searches inhospitable areas looking for stranded migrants — and their bodies.

While the group is based in California, the repeated calls that it receives about migrants traveling through the Rio Grande Valley prompted Hernandez to make the drive east in an effort to establish the networks needed to have his group search the areas around the checkpoint.

“I have gotten about 200 reports of missing migrants that were traveling through this area,” he said. “Unlike California or Arizona, most of this land is private property so we have to make contacts with the ranch owners so they will let us search through their property.”

Angeles Del Desierto attempts bringing closure to families, said Hernandez, who arrived with a list of missing migrants he hopes to find or rescue.

In 2012, Border Patrol has rescued about 300 immigrants and recovered more than 150 bodies in the Rio Grande Valley sector to date, said agency spokesman Enrique Mendiola.

“On top of the extreme weather, you have the dangers presented by the wildlife out there: coyotes, wild pings and rattlesnakes are just some of them,” Mendiola said, adding that immigrants also suffer from dehydration. “They are not able to carry enough water with them and if they do find water it is from a contaminated source.”

During his trip to the Valley, Hernandez trekked through one of the ranches searching for migrants and trying to survey the area to determine the dangers that migrants face. The biggest obstacles Hernandez faced were the “no trespassing” signs posted at many ranches.

With a backpack filled with emergency supplies and a cell phone, Hernandez walked for several miles searching for bodies or migrants in need of help. A cell phone is the best survival tool because migrants can dial 911 if they need help and authorities can pinpoint their location for rescue effort, he said.

“Sadly enough we were not able to find any migrants,” Hernandez said.

“We were, however, able to identify the body of a 12-year-old boy we had been looking for.”

Elmer Calinga Ceballos traveled from El Salvador to the U.S to seek a better life and reunite with his family; however, his journey ended on a table at the Elizondo Mortuary in Mission, where officials hadn’t been able to identify him.

Hernandez helped provide preliminary identification, which prompted the Salvadoran consulate to get involved and make arrangements to have the body sent home for burial.

When bodies turn up, the local sheriff’s office becomes involved.

Investigators at the Brooks County Sheriff’s Office have noted a sharp increase in the number of bodies discovered, said Chief Deputy Urbino “Benny” Martinez.

In 2010, deputies found 22 bodies. That figure had nearly tripled by 2011, when they found 64 bodies. But those numbers pale in comparison to the 95 bodies found so far this year.

Deputies find bodies at all stages of decomposition, including corpses that have been reduced to skeletal remains.

“This is a very sad case because these individuals are placed in the trust of unscrupulous individuals who will not hesitate to leave them to their fate,” Martinez said.

An additional danger is the predatory nature of the coyotes — guides — who sometimes sexually assault the women they’ve been paid to smuggle north, Martinez said, adding that his department is investigating five such cases.

“What makes it difficult to investigate is that many times all we have to go on is a nickname or a tattoo,” Martinez said. “The victim doesn’t know who that individual really is.”

Smugglers sometimes force illegal immigrants to carry drugs, leaving them exposed to federal prosecution.

“For the most part, they are hardworking people,” Martinez said. “The best choice would be for governments to have some way to fix this immigration problem so these individuals can travel in a humane fashion.”

Tuesday 9 October 2012

http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/news/local/article_b9ad0ca4-10f3-11e2-a700-0019bb30f31a.html

'John Doe' in '87 Arizona crash ID'd as missing teen

After nearly a quarter of a century in a pauper's grave, John Bryan Moore is going home.

Moore ran away from his home in Southern California at age 16, hitchhiking cross-country to Florida.

His family would wait for him for the next 24 years, wondering if he was just too scared to come home, or if he had settled down somewhere.

They never dared to move away or even change their phone number in the hopes that he might look for them.

As technology and social media developed, they searched for him with renewed hope on Google and Facebook.

Now, they are finally reunited, but it wasn't the outcome the family had hoped for.

"I think it's the beginning of the closure that at least now, we know that he's not out there in the desert someplace, or in the hills," his father, Joe Moore, said in an emotional news conference on Monday. "We know exactly where he's at and where he's going. To me, that would be better than me going to my grave and never knowing."

Moore died in June 1987, six months after he was reported missing. He was hitchhiking from Arizona to California -- his family believes he was coming home -- but died in a car crash on westbound Interstate 10 near Tonopah.

The only identification he had was on a duffel bag with his name misspelled -- authorities suspect that he might have changed it because he was a runaway or that the initial investigating officer wrote it down wrong.

Moore was buried amid hundreds of other nameless bodies at Maricopa County's Twin Butte Cemetery for the indigent, a gravel lot tucked away next to I-10 just south of Broadway Road in Tempe. A metal disc about the size of a coaster marked his grave as John Doe, case No. 87-1337.

In late 2010, the Maricopa County Medical Examiner's Office received a federal grant to begin exhuming more than 200 sets of unidentified remains and use new technology and investigative techniques to solve their cases.

So far, they have identified 11 sets of remains out of the 40 they have investigated. They have partial sketches and causes of death for others.

The county project is one of many across the country that the U.S. Department of Justice's National Institute of Justice funds. The Identify the Missing project focuses on unnamed bodies buried from 1950 to 1992. This spring, the county Medical Examiner's Office applied for another round of funding, which is expected to be announced soon.

Moore's case took nearly two years of intense cross-agency work, a team of dedicated investigators and some luck.

Investigators zeroed in on Moore's case, optimistic that they had enough leads to piece the puzzle together.

"He was a 16-year-old boy -- a boy who ran away from home. For us, this case has been painful because we all have children, and we know what it's like for someone to be missing," said Laura Fulginiti, a forensic anthropologist with the project.

There is minimal evidence available in most of the unidentified cases because burials were so long ago. It takes a wide-cast net and cooperation among several agencies, sometimes in different states, to make an identification.

Moore's fingerprints had initially been on file in California but for some reason were no longer in the system, leading to a lengthier search process, officials said. Detectives searched through a list of juveniles who were missing but no longer listed in the national missing-persons database. A search combining his age, demographics and characteristics yielded 30,000 results.

Moore's duffel bag also had a Florida address with it, according to the Arizona Department of Public Safety's report on the accident. But, at the time, attempts to identify him with that information failed, county officials said.

This time, Detective Steve Leon, who recently left the agency, began with the address and searched for more leads, narrowing down potential matches.

When he found the most likely candidate, the team contacted Moore's family members.

The family offered DNA samples right away. They matched. Moore's brother identified the tattoo on his chest -- his parents didn't know Moore had gotten it.

"This has been extremely overwhelming," said Joella, Moore's older sister. "Some people might think that we've had 24 years to prepare ourselves for this. There is no preparation because you always have hope."

She recalled times she and her brother shared at home in California -- before the anger issues that troubled him and which, his family believes, ultimately drove him to run away.

"We grew up in a small little country town. We built forts with spoons, in alfalfa fields, and threw rocks at cars when they drove by," she said. "We were getting into all kinds of trouble. A typical kid, you know? A little country kid."

It has been a rough few weeks for the family. They imagine his last moments and potentially suffering at a hospital in a different state by himself, she said near tears.

The family wonders if they could have found answers earlier: If his name wasn't "Brian" on his duffel bag, or if they had searched for variations of his name. They wonder how they missed the various Arizona news stories that had been published about Moore after the new program began.

The Moores urged other families with missing members to keep information updated in the national database.

Joe Moore urged other families to keep contacting law enforcement, especially if information disappears or becomes outdated on national missing-persons databases. "Don't give up," Moore said.

Tuesday 9 October 2012

Read more: http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/2012/10/08/20121008arizona-john-doe-arizona-crash-identified-missing-teen.html?nclick_check=1#ixzz28n3wqOBo

Baldia fire mystery deepens as 70 persons still missing

KARACHI, Oct 8: As the report of the Sindh government’s inquiry tribunal set up to investigate the Baldia Town factory inferno is keenly awaited, the mystery behind the deadly incident is deepening with each passing day, with more than 70 families of missing Ali Enterprises workers still looking for their loved ones and 39 charred bodies being kept at the Edhi morgue.

While the authorities are firm on 259 deaths in the last month’s tragic incident, the number of persons who were inside the industrial unit at the time of the fire and missing since put a serious question mark over their fate and the total number of casualties.

Background interviews with grieving families and interaction with labour and non-governmental organisations engaged with these families after the tragedy suggest that there are more than 70 families in the Baldia Town, Orangi Town and SITE whose loved ones have not yet returned home after the fire incident, which has turned the Ali Enterprise factory into a haunted place.

Amna Bibi is passing through dual tragedy. She is unaware of the fate of his paternal cousin Kamaluddin, a ‘helper’ at Ali Enterprises. Nobody has approached her to confirm his association with the industrial unit. The 66-year-old labourer was posted at the second floor of the garments factory, where most of the casualties took place.

“He had been living with us since childhood when his parents died,” she said. “He was unmarried and had no one in blood relation. After the incident, we have made every possible effort to trace him or his body in vain. People said he was dead, but how one could believe it without seeing his body.” Since the labourer had no sibling or child, no blood samples had been taken for DNA matching with the unidentified bodies.

Amna Bibi is not alone as Rehana Yasmin of the Hosiery Garment Textile Workers Union says her organisation has so far collected details of more than 60 families, which are unaware of the fate of their loved ones, employed at the factory.

“We have completed a survey of Badia Town and Orangi Town in collaboration with Piler (Pakistan Institute of Labour Education and Research),” she says. “Here we have 65 families whose members have been missing after the fire incident. If they have died, the casualties are much higher than reported as 39 bodies are yet to be identified.”

Similarly, she says, the union also came to know about New Karachi and SITE areas, where the families of Ali Enterprises workers are looking for their loved ones and their count could further increase the number of missing persons to more than 70.

The authorities have declared a total of 259 deaths in the fire that engulfed Ali Enterprise on Sept 11 evening and took more than 18 hours to extinguish with over 50 firefighters taking part in the operation using almost all available machinery and equipment of the city’s fire department.

Rescue workers insist that they cleared the industrial unit only after retrieving all bodies, including several charred ones, from the garment factory.

“The limbs and other parts of bodies were also recovered from the factory after the fire died down, but not in a huge number,” said chief fire officer Ehtashamuddin. “Almost all bodies are intact and it’s not possible that human remains in such a large number remained out of rescue workers’ sight.”

Tuesday 9 October

http://dawn.com/2012/10/09/baldia-fire-mystery-deepens-as-70-persons-still-missing/

Factory fire: Govt told to speed up victims’ identification

KARACHI: Finally there’s some hope for some 70 families whose beloved remain unidentified almost a month after the tragic Baldia factory fire.

The Sindh High Court has told the Sindh government to speed up the DNA matching process to identify the remaining victims of the country’s worst industrial disaster. The court has also ordered the authorities to submit the complete details of those killed or injured in the tragedy and provide compensation to the bereaved families.

On Monday, Justice Maqbool Baqir, heading a two-member bench, was hearing five similar petitions filed by different non-governmental organisations seeking judicial inquiry of the garment factory inferno that claimed 258 lives on September 11.

The petitioners’ lawyer, Faisal Siddiqui, moved a miscellaneous application to call complete details from the Sindh government of how many government departments or private bodies had announced compensation and who had so far given the money to the victims’ families or the survivors.

He added that nearly 70 bodies of people killed in the tragedy have still not been identified and the court should direct the government departments to accelerate the process of DNA testing.

Allowing the plea, the court gave 10 days to the authorities to provide the complete details of the victims and survivors of the tragedy and the amount of compensation, if paid, to anyone.

The judges also ordered the government to speed up the identification of unidentified victims and submit its report on the next hearing date.

Tuesday 9 October 2012

http://tribune.com.pk/story/448855/factory-fire-govt-told-to-speed-up-victims-identification/

19 troops killed in Egypt accident

EL-ARISH, Egypt, Oct 8 AP - An Egyptian official says a troop carrier has overturned on a mountain road in the Sinai Peninsula, killing at least 19 members of the security forces stationed on the border with Israel.

Health Ministry official Tarek Khater says the vehicle was transferring troops of the paramilitary Central Security Forces to their camp early Monday.

Khater says six others are in critical condition. A security official however says the injured number at least 48. He spoke anonymously because he was not authorised to speak to the press.

It was a different part of the Sinai from where the military is conducting a sweep against Islamic militants.

Road accidents are common in Egypt due to badly maintained roads and poor enforcement of traffic laws. Police estimate they kill about 6,000 people annually.

Tuesday 9 October 2012

http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/breaking-news/troops-killed-in-egypt-accident/story-e6freoo6-1226490980119