Ricardo Chavira Chicano

The U.S.-Mexico border is a vast land where weird things happen. Here is one recounted in my book: We Were Always Here: A Mexican American‘s Odyssey

In the fall of 1980, the San Diego office of the Border Patrol warned that undocumented immigrants had taken to throwing rocks at agents. Not only were agents at risk but so were the Border Patrol’s helicopters. The stone-throwing mobs had recently downed a low-flying chopper by directing rocks at the rear rotor, reported Border Patrol officials.

The editors and many of us reporters smelled fake news. How could throwing rocks upward with enough force to bring down a helicopter? Fellow Mexican Union-Tribune reporter Jesús Rangel and I decided to find out.

At that time, the territorial dividing line between Mexico and the United States was quite porous. There was no fence just east and west of the port of entry. However, that did not mean people could simply stroll into the United States, as is commonly believed. Border Patrol agents would set up a defensive human line some five hundred yards north of the border.

This created a broad no-man’s-land between the actual border and the Border Patrol defensive line. This in-between land served as a staging area for undocumented agents and smugglers. Plenty of Border Patrol agents were deployed, and buried sensors were set to detect footsteps here and there. Agents patrolled the defensive line aboard SUVs and ATVs and even on horseback. Typically, dozens of immigrants were apprehended, while others eluded capture by finding holes in the Border Patrol line, usually with the help of smugglers.

Jesús and I dressed in jeans, sweatshirts, and tennis shoes.

We walked to a staging area, some one hundred yards north of the border, near the Río Tijuana canal. About seventy would-be immigrants milled about. I asked several if they knew anything about the alleged chopper downing. All replied they’d heard nothing of the incident. After an hour or so, we saw a group of border crossers quickly walk north, deep into the United States. Suddenly, they wheeled back, looking shaken. Jesús asked one of the men why they had reversed course.

“Who the f__k are you?” a thuggish-looking man shouted. He pointed a long-barreled pistol at us.

“We’re reporters,” I replied. “Reporters, my ass!” he growled.

“Really, we are,” I said, my mind whirling, trying to calculate if escape was feasible. It wasn’t. The man, who I took to be a robber who preyed on immigrants, was simply too close to us. There was no escaping the big pistol.

Angrily, he ordered us to clasp our hands behind our heads and walk toward Mexico. My knees shook as I thought the pistol-wielding fellow intended to kill us out there in the dark scrubland.

As we walked, I saw other men with pistols rounding up immigrants. I recognized one as a Baja California State Police officer named Sergio. He had been part of the Baja California governor’s security detail, and we had exchanged pleasantries.

“Sergio!” I called out to him, and he immediately recognized me.

He asked the gunman to stop, and he walked over. “They’re okay. I’ll take over,” Sergio said to the gunman. “What are you guys doing out here?” he asked.

“We’re reporting,” I answered. “The question really is, what are you guys doing here?”

Left unstated was the fact that Mexican cops were rounding up immigrants in US territory.

“It’s a coordinated operation with the Gringos,” said Sergio. “We’ve been out here making arrests for a few nights.”

I looked north and saw that Border Patrol agents were shining bright lights into the brush in an apparent effort to detect hiding aliens. Sergio said we had to leave. Before doing so, I asked again if the arrests were conducted with the knowledge and backing of the Border Patrol. He assured me they were.

As we walked away, we saw a line of Mexican army trucks and soldiers taking the immigrants who had been apprehended to be escorted back to Tijuana.

Two days later, our story detailing the Mexican police incursion was published. It created a predictable stir and stern denials from the Baja California cops and the Border Patrol.

A year later, after he had resigned from his post, the commander of the Baja California State Police asked to have lunch with me. During our amicable meeting, he apologized for having called me a liar. He said the operation was off the books and had to be denied. It was plainly illegal to have Mexican police operate on US soil with the help of their American counterparts.