Oscar
Charleston, SC
Male, 31
Spent a bit over four years (2006-2010) serving as a Border Patrol Agent in Tucson Sector, AZ: the busiest sector in the country. Worked numerous positions, and spent the last year and a half operating/instructing ground radar installations. Duties included: field patrols, transport, processing, control room duties, transportation check, checkpoint operations, static watch duties, etc.
Very often, but this depended very much on the season - needless to say, summer months were the worst. I could not give you a percentage, but my station would find perhaps 50+ bodies a year. Add another 100+ in serious physical distress.
Many of the causes of death could not be determined by a simple glance. In AZ a body will be taken down to bones in less than 72 hours. When encountering a dead body we would refer it to the local Indian Police who would call their detectives etc. We were not trained in that stuff, so we'd simply secure the scene.
With all the crime in the desert it was anybody's guess how these people died. Many of the ones reported to us by other illegals would be located, and had died of dehydration (or some other form of sickness). We also did a lot of life-flights out of the desert when someone was in a bad way.
When a person gets dehydrated that badly, even if you life-flight them out and they make it to a hospital they will likely die. We were responsible for hospital watches, where we'd be stationed in a room with a person in custody. A dehydrated person would make a recovery within a day or two - but often their kidneys and other organs had already gone bad, and they would then pass a day or two later.
Some illegals were shot by bandits or cartel guys, or other illegals. Again, when you come across a pile of pink bones in the desert, it's hard to judge.
For these reasons, we are all very competent at search and rescue. We had a large number of EMT's and other first responders amongst the normal agents. When something very serious popped up we could call on BORSTAR (Border Special Tactics and Rescue) who are a specially trained unit of paramedics and rescue specialists.
With the size of the desert, we'd do everything we could to find people who were left, or in distress - but you can only spend so many man-hours on someone.
Many more illegals died at the hands of their smugglers (commonly called "coyotes"). These were often the result of horrific vehicle accidents. The smugglers would crash a truck carrying 30-40 people standing up in the bed. You can do the math I'm sure. These were the really serious incidents, where you'd have a dozen illegals killed and a dozen or more sent to hospital for serious surgeries, some paralyzed etc.
I, myself, only came across a handful of dead bodies in my time with the Patrol. I did respond to a couple of crime scenes, a homicide etc. I partook in search and rescue efforts a handful of times, and did find a number of stranded people. All in all, a dangerous place. I only ever really felt sorry for the kids. Some groups would leave behind 8-12 year old kids who couldn't keep up with the group. That angered me. No one should put a kid through that, or leave them behind to die.
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While I never looked too hard into it, we had a couple of options. Each station would have a handful of specialized units: Horse Patrol, Bikes, ATV's, Radar Operators, EMT's, first responders, etc.
Then each sector (which consisted of 4-6 stations, sometimes more) would have an SRT team, and a BORSTAR team. These teams would draw agents from the stations, and you'd work out of the sector headquarters. These teams deployed throughout the sector and also worked a lot of local stuff with other law enforcement agencies and local police departments.
You had some national level units such as BORTAC which would deploy on special assignments around the country. You also had "National SRT" and "National BOSTAR" etc. which were also nationally deployed. If I understand correctly, units such as BORTAC used to be employed outside of the U.S. (countering drug cartels in Central/South America) but are no longer used abroad.
These teams are obviously on call for any overly serious incidents. During things like Katrina the entire BP BORSTAR/BORTAC/SRT community is put on standby and many of them were utilized for SAR duties etc. When President Bush spoke at our Academy, the national SRT and BORTAC units were there to work with the Secret Service etc.
So it varies, but typical the real special type units begin at the sector level. I never worked in any of these units, though I frequently worked alongside them. Take the information here with a grain of salt as it may have changed or may be much more detailed than I have put forth here.
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The cartels are so busy - they have much bigger fish to fry. That being said, any LEO should always be on their guard. You're definitely not the most popular person. As far as Mexico for vacation - I'm not that gullible. Any country that suffers 60,000 people killed over a five year span along the border doesn't get any tourist money from me. It's on the State Department's "not recommended" list, but it won't stop Americans from trying to save a buck on liquor etc.
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I was and still am rather scrawny, so the academy was tough - but if I made it through, anyone should be able to. Regarding Spanish, they have eased the requirements significantly - but this is a bad move in my opinion. They teach very compartmented spanish in small blocks...so you learn commands vs. actually learning the language. You could always grab Rosetta Stone and start learning Spanish. It wouldn't hurt. The other alternative is to get a feisty Spanish-speaking girlfriend/boyfriend and learn the hard way.
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Debate Coach
Are presidential debates actually "debates", by the traditional definition?
Social Network Security Manager
How has Facebook remained mostly immune to hacks?
Suicide Hotline Manager
Has anyone killed themselves during a call?
I'm not entirely sure what happened to you. However, if you've been caught (by any law enforcement agency) with illegal substances it's often recorded by dispatch officers/personnel. If your license plate is run by other law enforcement officers/agents this information will pop up. This assists officers and agents in knowing what they're dealing with when they do a traffic stop. Prior arrests, detentions, and warnings etc. are noted in the large database.
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It's simple night vision and FLIR as carried by the military and other law enforcement agencies. Also the "midnight sun" or ridiculous huge powerful flood lights.
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Nope. Horrible. We had more issues, pursuits, assaults etc. from the Tohono O'odham people than we did from Mexican illegals. I'd say 75% of my encounters with TO's were negative. The vast majority of U.S. citizen smugglers we arrested were TO's. There is simply massive amounts of criminal activity on the reservation. Even some of the police and rangers were up to no good.
A drunk TO ran one of my ex-trainees off the road and killed him. We had numerous incidents where TO's would apprehend Mexican females and sexually assault/abuse them for weeks before someone found out.
There were a small number of TO's who would assist the BP, and this was normally out of spite for other TO's (one household or family would rat out another household/family). As a whole though, an extremely negative relationship.
Many of the TO's resented us because other than their own police/rangers and Sheriffs (who almost never went onto the reservation) we were the only law enforcement agency which was allowed to enter and operate on their land. They despised us for this. We ended up enforcing or assisting in a lot of non-immigration law enforcement duties because the TO's were always drunk and getting into trouble.
The BP rolled over and played nice (this is the kinder/gentler America after all) and refused to stand firm whenever an argument came up. It was quite disappointing. Everything was handled with kid-gloves, which was sickening to watch in many instances.
So, short answer: No. Not a good relationship.
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