Smugglers using ‘cloned’ vehicles to elude authorities

EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – Federal officials in South Texas arrested four alleged members of a smuggling organization after stopping a semi-trailer with Union Pacific logos transporting unauthorized migrants on Interstate 35, according to court documents.

It is but the latest instance of transnational criminal organizations trying to pass off conveyances used in migrant smuggling as corporate and even government vehicles.

On Feb. 15, U.S. Border Patrol agents in Newfield, Arizona, came across a van made to look like one of their own. It had the green diagonal stripe, emergency lights, and large numbers on the side like the real thing. It had been spotted picking up unauthorized migrants.

Border Patrol Tucson Sector Chief Agent John R. Modlin said his agents stopped the “cloned” van, arrested the driver, took custody of 11 undocumented individuals, and planned to prosecute an individual who assaulted an agent during the arrest.

Last June, Border Patrol agents and Texas Department of Public Safety troopers stopped three vehicles in El Paso carrying 11 unauthorized non-citizens. According to border agents, two cars “were identical” to white FedEx delivery vans.

“We haven’t seen a FedEx vehicle in some time,” Border Patrol spokesman Sean Coffey said. “We see other types of vehicles used, like construction vehicles, other vehicles that they put a sticker on that looks like a company vehicle.

On Monday, border agents at a highway checkpoint north of Laredo, Texas, observed what appeared to be a Union Pacific truck approach at 4:26 a.m. It was an unusual time for UP trucks to pass through and the driver was headed north, not east to the railyard, according to the agents.

The Border Patrol ran records checks on the trailer’s license plates and found they were not registered to Union Pacific. Agents stopped the semi, interviewed driver Edison Escalante, and allegedly were able to see people hiding in a cab compartment, court records allege. Other people were locked in the back, and agents had to use tools to break the locks and pull them out.

A total of 11 individuals determined to be in the United States illegally were taken into custody, along with the driver. Homeland Security Investigations agents interviewed some of the migrants, who tipped them to a stash house in Laredo where another 13 unauthorized non-citizens were being kept.

Court documents show the agents turned their attention to Escalante, who corroborated the existence of the stash house and turned over a cell phone with which he communicated with the smugglers. A second cell phone was found in the trailer “paired” with other communications devices HSI traced to a home in the 3600 block of Cancun Loop in Laredo.

Records show agents conducted surveillance at the home and watched a man, later identified as Jesus Aleman Serrano, leave the house with two unidentified individuals and transport them to a second location on Ligarde Street in Laredo.

HSI knocked on the door and arrested Clarissa Villarreal after she allegedly admitted to harboring two unauthorized non-citizens.

Court records show the agents executed a search warrant at the residence on Cancun Loop, allegedly found ledgers detailing evidence of human smuggling, and arrested Aleman Serrano and a woman named Fernanda Espinoza Izquierdo.

Aleman denied being involved in human smuggling despite the agents allegedly finding incriminating messages on his cell phone. Espinoza reportedly told investigators she was caring for “six or seven” migrants at the house who were no longer there.

Escalante, Aleman, Villarreal, and Espinoza are being held on charges of conspiracy to transport illegal aliens. Five of the migrants who said they paid an unnamed human smuggling organization to be taken from Mexico to the interior of the United States are being held as material witnesses.

Detention hearings have been set for March 5 in Laredo in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas.