By Karen Gleason
The 830 Times
Val Verde County Sheriff Joe Frank Martinez spoke about law enforcement aspects of the ongoing border crisis during a town hall meeting Thursday.
Martinez and Val Verde County Judge Lewis G. Owens Jr. spoke to a group of about 40 people at the Living Stone Worship Center. After their talks, Martinez and Owens fielded questions from attendees.
Martinez began his presentation with a statement of appreciation for Del Rioans’ support of law enforcement.
“First, I want to tell you all that what I’m most proud of is how our community came together to support local law enforcement. I take my hat off to this community. We have a hidden gem here, and when I would drive by some locations, there would be water stations set up by citizens. They had snacks. They had fresh-baked cookies, M&Ms, Cracker Jacks, whatever they wanted, any trooper, any National Guard, would show up and get that, so that’s what I’m most proud of, how they stuck together and supported law enforcement,” Martinez said.
The sheriff said the first inklings of the coming flood of immigrants began in January.
“On Jan. 18, we got a call to recover a (deceased) individual out of the river. It was a Haitian female, who was pregnant, at term, with twins. She was found on this side, the husband was found on the Mexican side . . . Since then, we’ve responded to 11 drownings. We had nine people die in car crashes that were involved in immigrant smuggling. We’ve had five or six individuals that died out on some of these ranches, due to the elements, the heat. That all falls on us,” Martinez said.
Like Owens, the sheriff had harsh words for Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, with whom Martinez has met numerous times, often via Zoom.
“I see he does a lot of talking in some of these meetings, but there’s no action . . . I don’t believe that Mayorkas is doing everything that he can, but I think the upper level, right above him, the policymakers, are basically controlling everything in D.C.,” Martinez said.
The sheriff said he also saw the frustration of U.S. Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz, whose statements to the media first had to be vetted by his superiors.
“The decisions that are made up in D.C., they’re not going to filter down here, so in March, I made a statement to some reporters that we’re on our own, so my goal at that time became to keep my community safe, my citizens safe, by whatever means.” Martinez said.
“I know I’ve been criticized for helping people out of the river, but because, you know, it was established early on where they were crossing, and if I could get there and get them to Border Patrol, they won’t be walking the neighborhoods, and that was the goal. They weren’t walking our neighborhoods,” he added.
Despite the unprecedented number of immigrants passing through the county, Martinez said his office has only five reports since February of criminal acts by immigrants and that only three of those reports relate to break-ins at hunting camps and stealing water, food, clothing and other items.
He said he doesn’t believe the five reports are a true number of criminal activity by immigrants.
“That’s not a true number because a rancher gets broke into, he calls Border Patrol. They never call the sheriff’s office, and Border Patrol is not going to do anything with reference to a burglary. They’re just not. So those three incidents, that’s all we have on paper, I suspect there’s a lot more because the victim does not call my office, where we’re going to do the investigation,” he said.
“There’s been some burglaries in south Del Rio, around the Pepper Lane area. My belief is those were committed by people out of Mexico. They’re using the crisis to be able to come over and go back, so there have been two burglaries that I know of and about three weeks ago, we broke up a group of about five individuals that were breaking into a residence off Mata Lane,” Martinez said, adding those arrested individuals will be prosecuted.
Martinez spoke about the number of inmates at the jail and the placement of a dedicated processing center for immigrants arrested for criminal trespass.
Martinez talked for some time about Border Patrol numbers for the Del Rio Sector, showing the huge increases in the number of immigrants flooding across the border.
The sheriff cautioned, however, that the number of immigrants reported by the sector doesn’t include those not encountered by Border Patrol, termed “got-aways.”
“The got-aways for this sector could be 200,000, very easily . . .We don’t know what we don’t know,” Martinez said.
The sheriff said the state had recently allocated $2.8 million to Val Verde County to allow local officials to buy additional equipment needed to meet the demands the border crisis has placed on local government.
“So in those funds, there’s money for overtime, there’s money for equipment, so to give you a real quick make up and most of you probably know, we’re the seventh largest county in the state. We share 110 miles of border with Mexico, the state of Coahuila.
“Any given day, I’ll have four deputies that are actually patrolling the community. So if they get called to handle an immigrant issue, that’s going to take away from my community, keeping my community safe,” Martinez said.
The sheriff also spoke about dealing with the Haitian encampment under the Del Rio International Bridge and reiterated his overarching concern throughout the year has been the safety of the communities in Val Verde County.
“My concern is that those individuals were not walking my streets. My concern was that my neighborhoods are safe. That was always my goal,” Martinez said.
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