MCALLEN, Texas – A convicted human smuggler who had been deported two times before is facing human smuggling charges. He is accused of running a human stash house where witnesses say he tried to rape a Salvadoran woman who was in the country illegally.
Hidalgo County Sheriff’s Deputies and U.S. Border Patrol Agents arrested 36-year-old Jose Manuel Flores Patino earlier this week when they raided a house near the Texas border, court records obtained by Breitbart Texas show.
The case began earlier this week when sheriff’s deputies got information about a human stash house in a rural area of the Texas-Mexico border. According to court records obtained by Breitbart Texas, deputies called Border Patrol agents to help them do a “knock and talk” which is a process where they knock on the door and ask for consent from the residents to search the property.
When authorities went to the house and knocked on the door, Flores answered. Moments later, however, about 12 illegal aliens inside threw the windows open and ran out trying to elude capture.
Once everyone in the house was captured, agents began to interview the aliens and spoke with Wendy Palacios, a Salvadoran woman who told the agents about the abuses in the house, court records show.
Palacios told the agents that a human smuggling organization charged her $7,000 to get her from El Salvador to Tennessee. Once she got to Texas, Flores picked her up and took her to his house where he had other aliens waiting for the next leg of the trip. The woman told agents that Flores told her that she would be sleeping in his room with him and spanked her on the buttocks before leaving the house to run another errand, court records show.
When Flores returned to the house, he slapped Palacios and tried to drag her into his room. The other aliens in the house responded to her screams trying to defend her until Flores gave up and let her sleep in the living room with the rest of the group.
A U.S. Magistrate Judge formally charged Flores with one count of human smuggling and one count of felony illegal re-entry ordering that he be held without bond. Flores criminal history shows that in 2008 a federal judge sentenced him to more than two years in prison form human smuggling, then in 2010 another judge sentenced him to almost five years for illegal re-entry and was deported in February after completing his sentence.
Follow Ildefonso Ortiz on Twitter @ildefonsoortiz.
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