Early in the morning of April 17th, in a scene described by the San Diego Union-Tribune as looking like "a war zone," a smuggler's northward race in an overloaded van, with 34 illegal aliens on board, ended when he lost control of the vehicle, sending it crashing into a popular supermarket. At the same time, another overloaded van containing 30 illegal aliens was fleeing northward while under surveillance of Border Patrol ground units and a Border Patrol helicopter. The second van was wildly driven into an orange grove by its smuggler-driver where it bogged down and human cargo spilled out in a futile attempt at escape....
Both vans bolted across the Mexican border at the Otay Mesa border crossing southeast of San Diego by running north through the southbound lanes. Mexican police, observing the two vehicles speeding up the wrong side of the road toward the border crossing, fired warning shots at the fleeing vans. The drivers, ignoring orders to stop and the shots fired by the police on the Mexican side, recklessly and violently put their passengers and the traveling public at terrible risk on both sides of the border.
Fortunately, despite the reckless disregard for the lives of their passengers and the public by the drivers of the vans, there were no fatalities, although all but one of the 34 people in the first van, including the driver, suffered various degrees of injury. It was nothing short of miraculous that others were not killed or injured as a result of the wanton behavior of the drivers of both of the vans.
These incidents were clearly well-planned, if not well-executed, criminal actions. It is reported that the tires of both vans contained a silicon substance intended to defeat tire puncturing devices that might be deployed against them to debilitate the vehicles. Clearly, the drivers were criminals who have no regard for human life.
In recent weeks, more and more smuggling incidents like these are happening at the border. Smugglers are getting bolder and bolder and are using every device at their disposal to evade the defenses of the Border Patrol. Unfortunately, the smugglers are encouraged to adopt a flight strategy to achieve success by the Border Patrol itself.
The Border Patrol has published and made widely known that it will never exceed the posted speed limits to intercept fleeing smugglers. This policy, while naively intended to protect the public is having just the opposite effect. It absolutely guarantees that every smuggler will exceed the speed limit to avoid pursuit and capture.
Any vehicle overloaded far beyond its maximum load capacity, as every vehicle used to smuggle aliens is, traveling even at low speeds is a deadly, uncontrollable missile. When an overloaded vehicle is propelled to speeds of 65 or 70 miles per hour or greater, the safety of the public and the occupants of the vehicle are always at grave risk. The Border Patrol needs to revise its pursuit policy to make it clear that any fleeing vehicle will be pursued and stopped in a firm and expeditious manner. Until that policy is changed, there will be an open invitation extended to some of the most amoral and conscienceless criminals on the planet to maim and kill with impunity.
