Border Patrol finds 55 people hidden behind false wall in box truck

3 weeks ago 90

Border Patrol agents arrested two men last Thursday after finding 55 people in the country illegally hidden behind a false wall inside of a box truck.

Brandon Lajohn Hargrove, a U.S. citizen born in 1981, and Jose Luis Castellanos-Hercules, a Honduran citizen born in 2003, are charged with conspiracy to transport people in the country from Mission to Zapata.

The arrests came after Border Patrol agents were conducting surveillance at 10:07 p.m. and observed a box truck arrive at a stash house in Mission and back into the driveway and into a carport, according to a criminal complaint.

At approximately 12:46 a.m., agents watched as the box truck left the Mission stash house and headed west on Expressway 83 bypassing several routes leading to Border Patrol checkpoints.

At 3:15 a.m., agents conducted a stop on the box truck for an immigration inspection near San Ygnacio and approached the driver, Hargrove, and asked him where he was going and what he was hauling, according to the complaint.

Hargrove opened the rear door and said he was hauling boxes, according to the complaint.

Once opened, agents saw Castellanos-Hercules in plain sight and he admitted to being in the country illegally.

After Hargrove gave consent to search, agents found 55 people hidden behind a false wall inside of the refrigerated box truck, including people from Guatemala, Venezuela, Mexico, Honduras, El Salvador, China, India, Colombia and Ecuador, according to the complaint. Two of the people were unaccompanied children aged 13 and 16.

In order to get out from the false wall, the people had to crawl through a small door. There were also heavy pallets of fruits and vegetables placed in front of the small access door making it impossible for the people to exit on their own free will, according to the complaint.

That document notes that a week earlier, agents observed a smuggling event that also involved the Mission stash house and on Aug. 15, agents stopped a box truck at the Border Patrol Hebbronville checkpoint and found 40 people in the country illegally, according to the complaint.

Investigators have linked that box truck to the stash house in Mission as well.

The suspects were scheduled to make a first appearance Monday in McAllen federal court in front of U.S. Magistrate Judge J. Scott Hacker, court records show.

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