Border Banditry on a Tuesday Night

And, Rascally Rabbits on Outlaw Motorcycles

Good Morning friends,

We had a whole plan for this morning’s newsletter, but we’ve had to upend it a bit, in favor of current events.

Tuesday afternoon, Chief Deputy Armando Garcia alerted the Kinney County area to a police situation:

A few hours later, a follow-up came from Sheriff Coe, wrapping things up.

We’ll be following up later this morning for more details about the alleged officer assault. Assault can take many forms of course and it’s not clear to us if an officer was struck, shoved, spat on or some combination of all of the above and more.

So, expect another newsletter sometime tomorrow during the day or the next.

It’s worth noting— suspects were captured several hours after managing to break contact with deputies. This suggests they were unable to arrange for a pickup or rescue from another driver.

It could be that these suspects were relatively unconnected, as we describe the vast majority coming through the area. It could also be that they just didn’t have any battery life left in their cellphones.

If you’d like to receive text alerts from the Kinney County Sheriff’s Office, just visit this webpage and sign up. It’s so easy, you might think something’s wrong.

This actually dovetails quite nicely with our original plans— last week we mentioned our intent to take a look at how more connected drivers and groups arrange for pick up.

To help, we’ve a few photos to share— and we’re setting the time machine to take us back to the earliest weeks of the border crisis, roughly 2 years ago.

That’s a look at the front door of the Kinney County Jail— lurking off to the side is a strange little motorcycle that’s been on location for longer than we’ve actually been employed with the County.

Initially we assumed it was one of the jailer’s rides, but the fact that it never moved, and a closer look at the license plate made it pretty clear that our assumption was wrong.

So, we asked around. Turns out, longtime County Deputy Manny Pena had the scoop.

The bike, he says, belonged to a suspect that was going out of his way to taunt deputies. Pena says one occasion the suspect even told him to his face, “I’m picking up the drivers from the bailouts— and you’ll never catch me.”

And, Pena says, for a while— they didn’t— they couldn’t. The guy was getting away with it. Apparently, any time someone happened to clap eyes on the guy, they already had their hands full with some other traffic stop— speaking to the manpower shortage the County had at the time. While some of that has abated, it’s a simple fact that you probably can’t have enough officers and deputies on hand.

Even now— he’s never been charged with a smuggling-related crime.

Turns out, the fellow was so successful that one night he had himself a little too much liquid cheer to celebrate. Deputy Pena says they found him and his bike on the side of the road passed out.

Can’t remember what he said they charged him with— it was probably something like public intoxication or drunk driving, and the bike was impounded.

The suspect never came back for it, and it’s sat outside the jail ever since.

Deputies believe connected drivers had this guy’s phone number on their cell phones. Anytime they had to run for it, they’d ring him up for a pickup.

Odds are— while deputies are rounding up scattered migrants and illegal aliens— connected drivers are slipping away, using their compatriots as distractions, while they arrange for a ride out of the area.

This particular motorcycle is a Chinese-made model, sold widely in Mexico. Keeway is a brand name used for export by the Qianjiang Motorcycle company.

It’s robust, easy to work on, and it’ll run forever.

It’s also unlawful for long-term use in the States, using what amounts to 1970s exhaust tech, which means it’ll never pass emissions tests.

But, if someone happens to ride it across a port of entry, they can generally ride as they please in the border area without registering it and that’s almost certainly how it wound up where it is now.

That was one cocky schmuck on a motorcycle who couldn’t keep his lips closed. What are the odds that there are a half dozen other people within driving distance that have been doing the same job in the intervening months since this guy was locked up?

Wouldn’t recommend betting against it.

Incidentally— Deputy Pena is retiring after many years as a county employee. He’ll take some time off, and then resume working under Operation Lone Star, as a ranch liaison between the Sheriff’s Office and Kinney County Ranchers.

The work will involve addressing concerns, answering questions, and also updating the Office’s knowledge of pertinent equipment, facilities, and vulnerabilities on local ranches.

That’ll do it for now— short and sweet. We’ll follow up hopefully later today with whatever we learn about this incident on Fort Clark.

Until then, have a great morning and we’ll see you soon.

As always, this newsletter is an independent work product, held apart from our day-work at Kinney County. It should not be mistaken for any kind of an official communication whatsoever. Any errors, misdeeds, or bad information are entirely our own.