THE BORDER – A charred hole near one man's front door and several lingering coughs are about all that's left to remind residents of Tijuana's Colonia Libertad of a time late last year when
las bombas were coming across the border fence.
NELVIN C. CEPEDA / Union-Tribune
José Arias Martínez, 75, has lived more than half his life in a small wooden house near the border. During times of greater smuggling activity, he would sell carnitas in the hills.
|
This is how locals refer to the tear gas canisters and pepper spray launched against smugglers by the Border Patrol, which operates just on the other side of the fence from this working-class neighborhood. For decades, the area has been considered a hub for human and drug smuggling traffic.
On the U.S. side, just east of the San Ysidro port of entry, agents had grown weary of attacks by smuggling organizations. In spite of two layers of fence, smugglers and their young foot guides were hurling rocks and gasoline bombs to distract agents, even setting up booby traps.
The agency has since attempted to counter smuggling operations that work out of Colonia Libertad by straightening and raising the height of the secondary border fence, installing spirals of razor-studded concertina wire at the top and dedicating more agents to the area.
It has been relatively quiet for months now, people on both sides of the fence say. Violent attacks against agents have dropped off sharply, while Colonia Libertad residents say the
coyotes who regularly ate breakfast at a small restaurant near the fence don't gather there as often.
“I think they have gone somewhere else,” said Sergio Avila, 51, who manages a convenience store nearby. “They've moved on to where it's easier for them.”
But with overall border-crossing arrests in the San Diego sector up from a year ago, no one is suggesting the problem has gone away.
Colonia Libertad, one of Tijuana's oldest neighborhoods, is a community of modest dwellings that dates to the 1930s. For more than two decades it has witnessed a steady flow of illegal border crossings. In the 1980s, before there was a fence, hopeful migrants gathered at an infamous border clearing known as the soccer field, waiting for nightfall. A lawless carnival atmosphere pervaded the area.
“There were mariachis, norteño groups,” said José Arias Martínez, 75, who has lived more than half his life in a ramshackle wooden house near the fence. “I used to sell carnitas in the hills. There was all this commerce.”
At the time, Arias said, “there were just three wires” separating the two countries. By the early 1990s, border fencing began to go up, first a crude metal fence made of used military landing mat, then a taller steel-mesh fence separated from the first by a road used by border agents, and dotted with bright lights and remote cameras.
But while the lawless atmosphere subsided, smugglers continued their trade. Empty houses in the hills became popular perches for spotters, peering over the fence with binoculars for a gap in vigilance.
In recent years, as the Border Patrol tried to gain control, smuggling organizations became increasingly aggressive. Agents were pelted with rocks, at times wrapped in gasoline-soaked rags and set aflame. They often responded with pepper spray, and occasionally bullets. In December 2005, an agent fatally shot a young man from the neighborhood who the agency said was linked to smuggling, something his family denied. Agents said he appeared to be throwing a rock.
“It wasn't uncommon in this area to have four or five rockings per shift,” said agent Julius Alatorre, driving his SUV along the fence recently past Colonia Libertad. “We have been trying to get operational control for years.”
In February, agents discovered a thick wire strung between the two fences. When pulled taut, it stretched across the road roughly at neck level, a decapitation hazard for agents riding all-terrain vehicles.
By the time this happened, confrontations between agents and smugglers had reached fever pitch. In December, Mexican officials confirmed a Nov. 26 incident in which 11 Tijuana residents received medical attention after being hit by tear gas. Other incidents were reported by witnesses and Tijuana media.
A small, charred pit scars the wall just to the left of the front door of Arias' home, which faces the United States a few feet from the rusty primary fence. It was left by an airborne tear gas canister late last year, he said.
“When the bombas hit us, we were getting ready to go to sleep,” he said. “Another one landed in our yard.”
Arias and others in the area, including his 9-month-old great-grandson, born shortly before the November incident, have lingering coughs that their doctors have told them are the result of inhaling the gas.
Arias complains of coughing fits and thick phlegm, for which his doctor has given him medicine and an inhaler.
The Border Patrol says the relative calm in the area can be credited largely to additional fortifications intended to deter climbers. In December, with help from the National Guard, the agency began straightening the secondary fence – previously angled toward Mexico – east of the port of entry. The sharp concertina wire was looped around the top. The fence is being reinforced in this way to the Otay Mesa port of entry.
Since December, in spite of the booby-trap wire, assaults against agents in the Colonia Libertad area have decreased dramatically, according to the Border Patrol. Between mid-May and mid-December last year, when the fence work began, there were 118 assaults against agents, mostly rock-throwing. Between mid-December and the end of July, there were 56.
In the seven months before December there were 5,194 migrant arrests in the area, compared with 2,976 between December and July.
However, total arrests in the San Diego sector continue to rise, up 6 percent between last Oct. 1 and July 31 compared with the same period a year ago. Most recently, apprehensions have been heaviest from the Otay Mountain area to the eastern edge of the county.
One recent morning in an area east of Colonia Libertadwhere the fence had been straightened but not yet reinforced with concertina wire, agent Alatorre was outside his vehicle when several yards away, a group of about five men quickly hopped the first fence, sprinted across the road and looped a flexible metal ladder over the 16-foot secondary fence. One had already made it to the top by the time Alatorre gave chase and the rest ran back south.
“Who knows, we could have a tunnel underneath us right now,” Alatorre said afterward. “It's gotten a lot better, and we've got the area under control, but the attempts are still going to be there.”
Staff writer Greg Gross contributed to this report.
Leslie Berestein: (619) 542-4579; leslie.berestein@uniontrib.com
