The Associated Press
The Associated Press
PEARL, Miss. – Detective Nick McLendon, on stakeout duty along a stretch of Interstate 20, noticed a red Chevy Suburban with tinted windows and no light over its rear Texas license plate.
The missing light gave him all the excuse he needed to pull over the SUV.
Packed into the Suburban, he discovered, were 14 illegal immigrants, two suspected smugglers, and a spiral notebook on the front seat, listing the passengers and their destinations in Spanish.
The arrests – some 800 miles from the Mexican border – represented a new and dramatic shift in U.S. immigration enforcement strategy.
Federal agents, with help from local law officers, have begun intercepting illegal immigrants and smugglers along stretches of highway deep in the U.S. interior, where those who have slipped into the country usually have little chance of getting caught.
But Operation Uniforce, as the two-week crackdown begun Jan. 13 is called, has resulted in more than 300 immigrants and suspected smugglers being arrested as of Tuesday.