05394
July 27, 2005   

Feeling the heat    

Desert aid workers face felony charges
for transporting border-crossers

by Evan Silverstein

     If convicted, they could face up to five years in

     Presbyterian church leaders in Arizona were instrumental in helping form the Tucson, AZ-based No More Deaths movement. For the past two summers, the group has provided food, water and basic medical care to illegal immigrants crossing from Mexico into the United States through Arizona’s treacherous desert borderlands.

     The coalition receives strong leadership and support from various Presbyterians, and from congregations such as Southside Presbyterian Church in Tucson, which provides medical care to undocumented migrants injured in the desert.

     Strauss and Sellz told the agents they were driving the three men to see a doctor at the Southside church because the migrants were vomiting repeatedly and one was suffering from bloody diarrhea. The volunteers were arrested under a federal statute making it a crime to transport illegal entrants.

     “Community members are outraged by this shameless injustice of arresting individuals while providing emergency aid,” No More Deaths said in a prepared statement. “People of conscience stand together in solidarity with those arrested, insisting that these volunteers were following a faith-inspired moral code of ethics.”

     The Border Patrol maintains that the men were healthy and needed

aren’t Presbyterians, rejected a government-offered plea agreement last week.

     A federal magistrate ordered both defendants to appear at an Aug. 2 videotaping of the deposition of the only border-crosser involved who remains in the United States as a material witness.

     If they are indicted, an arraignment hearing will be scheduled.

     The proposed plea agreement offered a dismissal of all charges in exchange for an admission of guilt and a year on probation.

     “We didn’t accept it because they wanted us to admit guilt, and that’s something that we didn’t want to do, because we didn’t think we did anything wrong,” said Strauss, who graduated last year from Colorado College in Colorado Springs. “We didn’t think it should ever be illegal to save a human life. I think it’s outrageous that they are prosecuting a case like this.”

     Sellz, who attends San Juan College in Farmington, NM, said, “We cannot stand by and watch others perish, and we can find no guilt in saving another life.”

     Sandy Raynor, a spokeswoman for the office of the U.S. Attorney, said the government could not comment on the plea agreement because it was not part of the public record.

     “Any statements that we have will be made in the venue of the courtroom,” she said.

     Strauss and Sellz were released from federal custody on July 11 as more than 100 supporters packed a Tucson courtroom and a hallway outside.

     On July 22, a federal magistrate approved a prosecutor’s request that a misdemeanor charge of aiding and abettingbe dropped. Each is now charged with one felony count of transporting an illegal immigrant.

     A blistering heat wave has left at least 56 people dead in the desert since July 1, setting a pace likely to make this the deadliest month since the bulk of migrant traffic shifted to the Arizona route about 10 years ago. At least 198 people have died since Oct. 1, according to medical examiners and the Border Patrol.

     Beth Sanders, media coordinator for No More Deaths, said the arrests will not deter the group, adding that the incident has strengthened the movement and increased solidarity among the members.

     The arrests came as tensions continued mounting between humanitarian groups and new Tucson sector Border Patrol Chief Michael Nicley, who has promised to crack down on anybody transporting illegal migrants for any reason.

     Border Patrol spokeswoman Andrea Zortman said that if anyone comes across illegal immigrants in need of medical attention, “the best thing to do is call 911, rather than to take matters into their own hands.” A severe medical need is not an excuse for transporting an illegal immigrant, she told the Presbyterian News Service.

     Aid groups had been told that it was legal to give immigrants food and water, but “anytime you put illegal aliens in your vehicle and transport them out of the area, you are committing a crime,” Zortman said.

     The 261-mile-long stretch of border in the Tucson sector is the nation’s main corridor for illegal immigrants entering the United States.

     The spike in deaths there has raised the concern of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). In 2003, the denomination’s 215th General Assembly approved an overture calling for measures to prevent migrant-worker deaths in the borderlands.

     The measure, submitted by the Presbytery de Cristo, which represents 30 Presbyterian churches in southern Arizona and western New Mexico, calls on Presbyterian Disaster Assistance (PDA) to be in relationship with congregations and middle governing bodies in the border areas to provide appropriate ministries and assistance to migrants in life-threatening situations. 

     In mid-April, the PC(USA) and the Synod of the Southwest sponsored a three-day conference on the crisis titled “Death & Life on the Border.”

     PDA provided $15,000 to the Synod of the Southwest to help finance the conference, and the synod kicked in $12,000. PDA also has contributed $20,000 to the Presbytery de Cristo to support a number of border projects, including No More Deaths. Money for the grants came from designated disaster funds and from the One Great Hour of Sharing offering.