The remains of 54 illegal immigrants have been found in one South Texas county. The number of dead illegal immigrants found in Brooks County has increased despite a massive effort by law enforcement to find the smuggled immigrants before they are killed.
“The numbers of immigrants and deaths has been overwhelming,” Brooks County Sheriff’s Office Chief Deputy Benny Martinez told Breitbart Texas on Monday. “But thanks to help from the state, the county is meeting the challenge of identifying and burying the bodies, for now.”
Following intense media coverage during the 2014 flood of illegal immigrants that reported Brooks County was exhausting its financial resources investigating and burying the bodies of the illegal immigrants who died in the county, the State of Texas dedicated additional financial and manpower resources to assist the county. Breitbart Texas has reported extensively on the massive humanitarian problem faced by Brooks County.
Over the past several years, the sheriff’s office of this small community located about 80 miles north of the Texas border with Mexico has been overwhelmed by the flood of illegal immigrants. Many of these immigrants have died while attempting to sneak around a U.S. Border Patrol checkpoint located in the middle of the county.
The numbers of bodies found has increased this year despite a massive effort by U.S. Border Patrol agents and the State of Texas who have supplemented the county’s efforts to stop the deaths with additional manpower and resources for the state’s poorest county.
Both the U.S. Border Patrol and Texas Department of Public Safety have increased their presence in the county since 2014, Martinez explained. “When our deputies are tied up with recovering the bodies or helping search for immigrants reported to be in distress or missing, we have no one available to handle our county’s law enforcement needs,” he concluded.
Bob Price serves as associate editor and senior political news contributor for Breitbart Texas. He is a founding member of the Breitbart Texas team. Follow him on Twitter @BobPriceBBTX.