Whether most — or even a significant fraction of — corrupt federal border agents are caught and punished is an open question. Customs and Border Protection boasts of more stringent screening and monitoring of its agents but releases little data to back up its claims.
Bordering on Insecurity
Throughout 2016, The Texas Tribune took a deep look at the issues of border security and immigration, topics never far from the headlines — or the presidential trail. The Tribune reported on the reality and rhetoric around issues like the removal of undocumented criminal offenders, the stemming of government corruption and the conditions many immigrants are fleeing to seek sanctuary in the U.S.
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Bordering on Insecurity
Reveal Radio: When Border Watchdogs Become Criminals
This hour of Revealfeatures a joint investigation with The Texas Tribune on federal border watchdogs who turned criminal.
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Bordering on Insecurity
Border Corruption Often Has Family Roots
David Cruz joined the U.S. Border Patrol because he wanted to be “part of the best.” But family pressures, disillusionment, love and greed drove him to begin taking bribes to help immigrants enter the country illegally.
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Bordering on Insecurity
Cracks in the Wall: When Border Watchdogs Turn Criminal
Rudy Soliz did it for sex. Sergio Lopez Hernandez blamed depression and financial trouble. The crimes differ, but prosecutors say the actions they’re accused of weakened the U.S. borders and ports of entry they were tasked with protecting.
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Bordering on Insecurity
Love and Money Join Agent, Drug Smuggler
Former U.S. Border Patrol Agent Raquel Esquivel still wears a government-issue green uniform, but now it’s a federal prison jumpsuit. She was convicted in 2009 of helping smugglers sneak loads of marijuana across the border.
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Bordering on Insecurity
How Investigators Linked a Headless Body to a Border Patrol Agent
When Franky Palacios Paz was found naked and decapitated floating off South Padre Island, the local sheriff thought the murder would lead investigators back to Mexican drug cartel violence. He didn’t expect a U.S. Border Patrol agent to be among those arrested.
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Bordering on Insecurity
A Border Rancher on the Art of Survival
For more than two centuries, the Escobar family has ranched along the Rio Grande. For almost as long, smugglers have moved people and product across their property.
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Bordering on Insecurity
Boats off the Water Little Help in Border Security
Boats are one of the most effective ways to patrol the 300 miles of river and lakes under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Border Patrol’s Rio Grande Station. But the boats aren’t in the water around the clock.
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Bordering on Insecurity
Life on the Line: High Stakes in a Texas Smuggling Corridor
In this mini-doc shot in a high-traffic smuggling corridor, watch a “coyote” moving undocumented workers through the woods, listen to a Guatemalan teenager recount her journey to South Texas and ride along with a busy team of U.S. Border Patrol agents.
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Bordering on Insecurity
State Scrambles to Fund Border Security Project
Wiping out the tall stands of Carrizo cane that give drug and human smugglers easy cover along the Rio Grande was deemed a border-security priority by Gov. Greg Abbott in 2015, but the program wasn’t funded.