Border Park - Kevin Knoblock

Border Park
Saturday, December 17, 2006
Enrique invites me and my crew to his annual Christmas Posadas event at the border
fence separating Chula Vista, California and Tijuana del Mar. Posadas commemorates the
journey of Mary and Joseph into Bethlehem and their search for lodging.
It was a very emotional afternoon. A San Diego area preacher ran the event, and Fran-
cisco Javier Herrera, a local musician, translated into Spanish for the crowd. The preacher introduced people on the other side of the fence who had been recently deported.
One woman told of being separated from her children after she was deported for a drug
problem. She broke down in sobs several times as she recounted her story and promise
to change her life.
The names of several dozen people who had died in the desert attempting to cross into
the United States were read aloud by volunteers, including Enrique. Their names were
also written on flickering ‘farolitos’ - paper sacks with candles, that were lined up along a
wall on the US side.
The preacher talked about the fence not being there when he was young, and said ‘those
who want to build the wall’ should ‘go to hell’. The crowd cheered.
Christmas carols were sung, and then gifts were exchanged. Enrique brought sackfuls of
stuffed animals and candy and tossed them over the fence with great delight.
As the sun went down, everyone lit candles. Enrique held his small cross and candle and
was interviewed by several local news crews. Later, we drove with Enrique into Tijuana
to film at Casa Migrante, the migrants’ house.
nogales shoot
Sunday, February 5, 2006
Super Bowl Sunday. Meet Matthew Taylor at LAX and fly to Tucson. Rent a car and
drive south to Nogales for a week shoot embedded with the Border Patrol in one of
the busiest sectors for illegal immigration. Will have two camera crews going most
of the week.
6am Monday morning. We arrive at the Nogales Border Patrol station - the largest facility in the country. It takes a little longer to get two crews mounted up and
ready to go and we’re a few minutes late to the morning briefing of Disrupt Team.
We enter the room and Lu Maheda is running the morning meeting. He shoots me a
look that I think means ‘you’re late’ or ‘I agreed to do this but I don’t have to like
it’. It turns out to be neither.
Lu was chosen by Homeland for a good reason. He’s a real leader and will help us
enormously during the week.
I load into Lu’s Tahoe with his partner Jay Johnson and my crew. Lu tells us we
picked a good morning. Five groups have been spotted crossing the border and
waiting for their drivers. Lu says they try to tail the groups to stash houses in order
to get the leaders of this organized smuggling. Those are the guys who can get the
felony charges.
We pull into the Shell Station just north of the Port of Entry and wait no more than
5 minutes before it starts. It’s the beginning of a wild and eye-opening week witnessing a constant flow of illegal immigrants crossing the border - 4000 a day here
in the Tucson Sector. It’s a week of car chases, surveillance, stash house raids, desert rescues of stranded migrants and even an assault on a federal agent - our agent
- Lu Maheda.
Tuesday morning
Could our second day with Disrupt be as much of an adrenaline rush as the first day?
And yes I realize we are talking about more than just another ‘shoot’ here.
Dawn call. I ride with my b camera to be sure they are getting coverage. We ride with
Disrupt Agents Dave Villareal and Chris Peterziek. I send first unit in with Lu Maheda.
Dave Bossie has arrived for a couple of days on location and I figure he’s best with Lu
for a ‘get to know you’.
We saw him yesterday during the five car load up, but the Green Escort Driver will turn
out to be our guy today. He’s smart, and makes herky-jerky moves for a couple of hours
before he loads up. With two cameras rolling, we see him cruise all ‘jacked up’ - riding
high on bigger rear suspension before loading up at the King Louis area.
PARENTS EMIGRATED LEGALLY FROM MEXICO and
The Green Escort Driver takes off North and Dave and Chris and my b unit shooter Chris
MAHEDA HEADS THE UNDERCOVER DISRUPT TEAM, U.S. BORDER PATROL, NOGALES ARIZONA
Wagner and I take off after him - at a distance. He senses us and we have to break off.
The helicopter covers him but soon Chris Peterziek calls Jay Johnson and Lu Maheda and
INT. BORDER PATROL STATION – CONFERENCE ROOM - DAY
suggest we ‘take him down’.
Lu runs the morning meeting. DISRUPT AGENTS include Jay Johnson, Christopher Pietrzak,
Permission given, we pursue the Green Escort Driver to a Motel 8 parking lot off MariDavid Villareal, Guadalupe Serna and Glen Fouty.
posa. Corner him, or so it seems.
The Green Escort Driver executes two incredible escapes - the second however is aimed
LU MAHEDA (over shot)
right at Lu Maheda, who has just exited his vehicle. Lu get crushed between his driver’s
Disrupt team is an anti-smuggling immediate strike team.
side door and his vehicle and falls to the ground in pain.
That means we don’t do long-term investigations but rather
short-term investigations, uh, with really long-term effects
Lu gets up in shock and curses and yells for everyone to mount up for the pursuit. The
in a community.
Green Escort river heads back to the border, with our two vehicles and a helicopter in
pursuit.
INT. BORDER PATROL MASTER CONTROL – CAMERA ROOM – DAY
As we race to the border and weave between traffic in a top heavy SUV, I realize I lied to
Agent Guadalupe ‘Lupita’ Serna works a joystick controlling one of over 20 cameras in the control
my wife about playing it safe.
room. The cameras scan various sections of the US/Mexico border at Nogales, Tucson Sector.
The Green Escort Driver makes it south and crosses back into Mexico. We have called
LUPITA SERNA(into microphone)
ahead and the Mexican authorities say they have him in custody.
Ok Disrupt Agents – we just spotted a group crossing the
King Louis area, standby we’re gonna be scanning to
But when our camera crew arrives - and Lu meets with the Mexican Border authorities,
see if any load vehicles are coming around.
they tell him they let the young male driver go. They claim they ran his plates and he
came up clean and they could not hold him.
LUPITA’s SURVEILLANCE CAMERA
Lu asks that the next time they receive a call that a suspected human smuggler exShows several men who have just entered the Unites States illegally.
ecutes a vehicular assault on a Federal Agent, is notified of same, to please hold him for
another five minutes while the US authorities follow the protocal necessary for crossINT. MAHEDA’S DISRUPT VEHICLE – DAY
border cooperation.
Lu and his partner, Agent Jay Johnson, are parked at a gas station near the Nogales Port of Entry.
Agent Maheda will later speculate - off the record - what happened. Safe to say that
organized smuggling has a lot of pull across the border.
Lu survived the hit and run with a bruised chest and back. If the Green Escort Coyote
had hit Lu’s door maybe six inches to the left - or closer to the door frame - Lu could
have been seriously hurt, or killed.
Later that morning Disrupt raids the Green Escort Driver’s stash house north of Nogales
and pull out 43 illegal immigrants - held as prisoners until they arrive at their final destination.
LU MAHEDA
Well this morning we’re working the west truck
gate - it’s the second port of entry here in downtown
Nogales. One of our Disrupt Agents is up in our camera
room and we’re using our remote video surveillance
cameras to observe just west of this port of entry.
She observed about 24 people waiting to come across.
INT. BORDER PATROL MASTER CONTROL – CAMERA ROOM - DAY
Lupita’s surveillance camera shows the ‘scout’ talking on his cell phone in a parking lot called ‘King Louis’.
INT. MAHEDA’S DISRUPT VEHICLE
LU MAHEDA
So this is just their first phase is coming across, and from here they go to what we call a ‘stash house’, which
could be a hotel or an actual residence.
lupita SERNA (over shot)
It looks like the scout is the one in the red.
INT. BORDER PATROL MASTER CONTROL – CAMERA ROOM
Lupita’s surveillance camera shows a line of people running along the highway, jumping a guard rail and
heading into the King Louis parking lot, a known staging area for drivers of illegal immigrants who have just
crossed the border into the US.
LUPITA SERNA (over shot)
They’re low crawling along the guard rail.