What do you need?

Baboquivari mountain dominates the Arivaca desert in southern Arizona. At 7,730 feet its rocky summit towers over the surrounding peaks. Local legend has it that a group of Spanish conquistadors tried to dig into Baboquivari in search of gold and were swallowed whole by the mountain.

There is a trail from Sasabe, Mexico that connects to and follows the Baboquivari ridgeline before dropping down into the valley below. On that trail in one of the saddles 5,400 feet above sea level No More Deaths maintains a water drop for migrants making the perilous journey along the ridge.

On Tuesday, June 26, all the summer and long-term volunteers set out to fill this drop. We packed gallons of water, beans, trail food and socks into the trucks, drove to the closest point at the bottom of the ridge and prepared to climb. There is no trail leading up the side of the ridge, we had to pick our way through mesquite trees in washes, scramble up dried up waterfalls and crawl up sheer slopes of desert gravel and brush carrying up to 8 gallons of water and 2 cases of beans.

I began the day with 3 gallons of water and 2 bags of socks in my backpack. I also carried with me my lunch, personal water bottles, cell phone, passport, Green Card (in case we encountered Customs and Border Patrol), driver’s license, first-aid kit, sketch book and pencils and a bunch of other random small items that accumulate in your backpack during a week and a half in the desert.

The gallons of water were the first casualties of the day, one abandoned at the bottom of a waterfall rock scramble that rose 1,400 feet in under a quarter of mile, the other two left at the top as we clambered through the scrappy trees and rocks.

As I began the final ascent, using the scrub grass to hold on, my feet slipped on the gravelly sand, so the backpack had to go too. I dropped it under a scrawny looking tree, only saving my lunch and personal water bottle. My friend, Naomi offered to carry my lunch, so I would have one free hand to steady myself if my feet lost traction.

Taking the last part of the climb in 100 feet chunks, never looking up to see how much further it was and with Naomi’s patient encouragement I made it to the top of the ridge. From the top, sitting at the water drop I could see the vastness of the desert, the huge distances between the small pockets of human habitation and the main road from Nogales to Tucson with its CBP checkpoint forcing migrants out into the massive inhospitable terrain.

I left my life on Baboquivari. Every official document that proves who I am, my connections to world and my attempts to make sense of my place in it. The mountain said all I need is water and a friend. At the top, having bought no gallons of water, I was nothing more than a friendly presence in the desert, wondering and compassionate for all those who leave more than their material lives on the trails, washes and ridges in their quest for a better life.

Say His Name

Sometime between June 18th and 20th, Cidonio Torres-Reyes crossed the US Mexico border and began the perilous journey across the Arizona desert. On June 21, Mr. Torres-Reyes was apprehended by US Customs and Border Patrol (CBP). He was detained and charged with illegal entry (8 USC 1325) and he was recommended to have his case heard through Operation Streamline.

Operation Streamline is a part of the overall US government immigration policy of Prevention through Deterrence.

The central idea behind Prevention through Deterrence is that by making the border crossing as difficult and dangerous as possible and facing the threat of criminalisation and family separation if caught by CBP, migrants will decide that the rewards are not worth the risk. This policy was inaugurated by the Clinton Administration in the mid-1990s. Knowing the havoc that NAFTA would wreak on Central American small farmers and businesses, the US government took steps to shut down its southern border to people at the same time as they opened it up to corporations. The resulting border fences at towns such as Nogales, El Paso and Sasabe, forced migrants into the harsh climate of the deserts in Arizona, New Mexico and Texas.

Subsequent administrations from Bush II to Obama to Trump have expanded the scope of Prevention through Deterrence to include militarization of border towns, expanded border surveillance and personnel, family separation and the criminalisation of migrants, including through Operation Streamline.

Operation Streamline was launched in 2005 under the Bush II administration. The program fast tracks migrants through the court system by hearing multiple cases together, often prosecuting more than 75 migrants per day, 5 days a week.

Defendants are bought into the court room in groups of 6 to 8. Each defendant is assigned a pro-bono lawyer who explains the process to them. Each lawyer will represent one defendant in each group, resulting in 1 lawyer representing 10 to 12 defendants during each hearing. In addition to representing multiple defendants, due to the fast track nature of Operation Streamline, often defendants are apprehended by CBP only 1 or 2 days before they appear in court. Therefore, each lawyer will only have 30 minutes to an hour to speak with each defendant they are representing before the hearing begins.

Operation Streamline handles 2 types of immigration cases. First, illegal entry (8 USC 1325) is a criminal misdemeanor with a maximum sentence of 6 months. Second, illegal re-entry (8 USC 1326) is a felony punishable by up to 2 years in prison.

The defendants are lined up before the judge and given head phones to listen and respond to a Spanish interpreter. Interpreters in other Central American indigenous languages are not provided, despite Spanish being a second or third language for many defendants. Through the interpreter the judge informs the defendants of their right to trial and then asks a series of questions designed to achieve the bare minimum in showing that the US government has upheld the defendant’s legal rights and elicit a final response of “culpable” (guilty) from each defendant before passing sentence.

On June 22, 2018, I attended, Operation Streamline in Tucson, AZ as a volunteer with No More Deaths. Our goal in observing the hearing was to identify any defendants with physical injuries and note any requests made for asylum and follow up with immigrant’s rights activists within the legal and medical communities. Mr. Torres-Reyes was one of the 75 defendants processed that day. He did not stand out, there was nothing defining or unusual about him, he did not appear to have any physical injuries and he did not request asylum. As is usual for illegal entry cases, the judge sentenced him to time served and ordered his deportation.

I returned to the desert on Sunday, June 24 with No More Deaths for my second week as a volunteer.

Friday, June 29 bought me and my fellow volunteers back to the Arizona courthouse. The judge processed the illegal entry cases and then moved on to illegal re-entry cases. When a migrant is charged with illegal re-entry they are strongly encouraged to accept a plea bargain. They plead guilty to the original misdemeanor charge of illegal entry (1325) and serve a sentence of 30 to 180 days in prison, in return the US government drops the illegal re-entry (1326) charge, which carries a sentence of 2 years. After serving their time in a private prison they will then be deported.

When the third group of defendants charged with illegal re-entry were called into the courtroom the judge called Cidonio Torres-Reyes. I recognized the name immediately and rummaged through my papers for the defendant list from the previous week.

Piecing together a timeline, presumably, Mr. Torres-Reyes was deported to Nogales on Saturday, June 23. Between Sunday, June 24 and Tuesday, June 26 he crossed the border again. He was apprehended by CBP on Wednesday, June 27 and pushed through Operation Streamline again on Friday, June 29.

Mr. Torres-Reyes was sentenced to 75 days in prison. His sentence should end around September 10, 2018, when he will be turned back over to ICE for deportation.

I have never spoken to Mr. Torres-Reyes, 3 weeks later my memory of his features is hazy, and I would be hard pressed to pick him out of a crowd. I have a deep admiration for his strength and fortitude in attempting the same dangerous journey twice within 2 weeks. Every day I say his name, so that he knows he is not forgotten and so that I do not forget that the victims of Prevention through Deterrence and Operation Streamline are not numbers, they are individuals with determination, goals, dreams and names!