Texas Counties Start Charging Illegal Aliens With Child Endangerment, Trespass

[IceWizard]

Texas Counties Start Charging Illegal Aliens With
Child Endangerment, Trespass

Charlotte Cuthbertson
Jun 1, 2021




Kinney County Sheriff Brad Coe talks about the impact of the border crisis
in his county, in Brackettville, Texas, on May 23, 2021.
(Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times)


BRACKETTVILLE, Texas—The tens of thousands of illegal aliens that evade Border Patrol
every month—hoping to slip undetected to large cities up north—are now being confronted
by sheriffs who are starting to charge them for trespassing, evading arrest on foot, and
endangering the life or health of a child.

Seeing no solutions to the border crisis from the federal government, some counties are
looking at all possible means to rein in the high-speed vehicle pursuits, trespassing,
break-ins, vehicle thefts, and other crimes that are increasing in their communities.

“I’m going to start here, locally. If we catch them, we’re going to start prosecuting these
people that are trespassing on y’all’s property,” Kinney County Sheriff Brad Coe told an
appreciative crowd in Brackettville, Texas, on May 22. “And whatever other legitimate
charge we can stack on there to try to deter them from coming to Kinney County.
We’re going to try to hold these people accountable.”

Neighboring Edwards County is doing the same.

Coe said his county would start charging for trespassing on June 1. He provided ranchers
with a form that would authorize the sheriff to file charges on their behalf if someone is
caught on their property—saving the rancher from coming into town to press charges every
time a trespasser is caught. For many local ranchers, it’s a daily occurrence.




(The Epoch Times)


Coe said the sheriff’s office recently filed child endangerment charges against a woman who
bailed out of a vehicle that had been pulled over by a deputy. The woman grabbed her 7-year-old
child and ran into the scrub without food or water. The deputy caught her and the child and
then called the sheriff to ask what she should do with them.

“And I said, ‘Now’s the time to start,'” Coe told The Epoch Times. “Let’s file charges against
her for child endangerment based on the fact that she ran out of the car, she had no bags,
no nothing with her, no food, no water for that kid, 7 years old. You’ve seen the weather
down here, some days it’s 90 degrees, 110 degrees. What was she planning on doing with
that child in the brush with no food and no water?”

The woman and child were turned over to Border Patrol, while the sheriff’s office will present the
child endangerment case to a grand jury to decide if it’s a valid case for prosecution, known
as a true bill.

“If they ‘true bill’ it, then we’ll put a warrant out for her arrest, and wherever she turns up, we’ll
go get her and bring her back,” Coe said.

“If we do arrest her, and she gets sentenced to a year or six months, whatever the case may be,
if she ever tries to file for some type of assistance here, or become a citizen …
that’d be a check mark against her.

“Some type of consequence has to be there.”



‘We’re Hoping They Avoid Our County’

Border Patrol detects a daily average of around 1,000 illegal aliens who evade capture along the
southern border. The number of those who pass undetected is impossible to estimate.

Most of the illegal aliens passing through Kinney County are adult males who have crossed the border
in the Del Rio Border Patrol Sector—usually into the small cities of Del Rio or Eagle Pass.

The sector is experiencing record-breaking numbers, and so far in the current fiscal year
(which began on Oct. 1, 2020), Border Patrol has apprehended illegal aliens from 70 countries,
according to information obtained by The Epoch Times.

Border Patrol in the Del Rio Sector has apprehended 95 sex offenders this fiscal year, compared to
six during the same period in fiscal 2020. Apprehension of criminals has topped 813 compared to
161 in the same period in fiscal 2020.

Kinney County Attorney Brent Smith is preparing to take up a slew of new trespass cases, while
the district attorney deals with the felonies, such as human smuggling.

After an illegal alien is arrested for trespassing, Smith will examine the evidence in the case file
from the sheriff’s office. If it’s determined that trespass occurred, he’ll charge the individual with
trespassing, which is a Class B misdemeanor. The charge is elevated if the individual has a deadly
weapon or is found more than 100 feet past the property line on agricultural land.

Once charged, the suspect will make a plea, and if they plead guilty, they’ll most likely be released
with time served (two to three days) and be turned over to Border Patrol.

It’s not a big penalty, but Coe and Smith say it gets illegal aliens into the system and
gives them a record.

“We’re hoping they avoid our county,” Smith said.

“We’re trying to make sure they’re held accountable for breaking the laws in our state and
our nation. And so, if Biden is not going to enforce the law, then we’re going to try to enforce
our own state laws.”



Kinney County Attorney Brent Smith on his ranch near Brackettville, Texas,
on May 25, 2021.
(Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times)



On April 21, Kinney County declared a local disaster due to the impact of the border surge,
saying in its declaration that the “health, life, and property” of its residents are “under imminent
threat of disaster from the human trafficking occurring on our border with Mexico.”

More than two dozen counties have since also made disaster declarations or are in the process of it.

Smith said Texas should act on its own to enforce its border with Mexico.

“It is my opinion that an emergency declaration by Governor [Greg] Abbott or the
Texas Legislature would authorize Texas to take certain steps in the enforcement of its
own borders and the protection of its citizens’ health, safety, and welfare,”
he wrote in an open letter in April.



From The Epoch Times

[Charon]

They grow em big in Texas. And, they grow em with intelligence. Patriotic thinking. And a fine respect for ladies.

Well done, Texas. *And to hear the wee ones are being transported at night? And seeing another video of Joe stopping a speech to talk about a little girl looking 19 to him, and then two little girls he ran up to so they would know they will get icecream later. gag me with a spoon.*