In Phoenix, Smugglers Prey on Immigrants

From the Wall Street Journal, "Immigrants Become Hostages as Gangs Prey on Mexicans":

A whispered 911 call from a cellphone early one January morning brought police to a home on West Columbine Drive in this Phoenix suburb. Inside, they found more than 30 half-naked and shivering men -- prisoners, police say, of a gang that had smuggled them in from Mexico.

Beaten and threatened with a 9-mm Beretta pistol, a local detective's report said, the men were being shaken down for as much as $5,000 apiece, a ransom above the $1,000 that each had agreed to pay before being spirited across the border.

Such cases are increasingly common in Phoenix, which is gaining notoriety as the kidnapping capital of America. Authorities blame forces ranging from Mexico's rising drug violence to a gang takeover of the immigrant-smuggling business.

Another factor: the volatile housing market in the city, which has left it strewn with thousands of rental houses on sometimes sparsely populated suburban blocks, handy places for smugglers to store either drugs or people. The police call these "drop houses." They say federal, state and local authorities discovered 194 such houses in 2007, then 169 last year and dozens more so far in 2009.

While most of Phoenix's abduction cases relate to the drug trade, as dealers snatch rivals to demand ransom or settle debts, increasing numbers involve undocumented migrants. "Of 368 kidnap cases last year, 78 were drop-house cases involving illegal aliens," says Sgt. Tommy Thompson of the Phoenix Police Department. Officials say that in 68 alleged drop houses identified in the first five months of 2009, authorities found 1,069 illegal immigrants.

What's happening here marks a shift in the people-smuggling business. A couple of decades ago, workers commonly traveled back and forth across the U.S.-Mexico border, going to the same American farm or construction job each year. To make the passages they often would use the same smuggler, called a "coyote," each time.

Now, organized gangs own the people-smuggling trade. According to U.S. and Mexican police, this is partly an unintended consequence of a border crackdown. Making crossings more difficult drove up their cost, attracting brutal Mexican crime rings that forced the small operators out of business. The Phoenix area also was affected because tougher enforcement at the border focused on traditional routes in Texas and California -- funneling more traffic through Arizona along desert corridors controlled by Mexico's Sinaloa drug cartel.

Read the entire article, here.