The History of Border Patrol (part 2)

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
Hi everyone. This is Carmen and Christina and this is
Eastodias Unknown, a podcast where we talk about Latin American history,
sometimes the horrible, and deals with heavy topics like racism, corruption,
and genocide. But more than that, it's also by resistance,
power and community. Okay, So we are continuing to talk
about the history of Border Patrol, and last week we

(00:33):
talked about restrictive immigration laws leading up to the creation
of Border Patrol, as well as their early years of
border patrol, like their low budget, lack of clear roles
and oversight, and the dynamics of the men who joined
Border Patrol in its early years. And that was just
a reminder, yes, thank you, Well a refresher of what
we covered is always good. Yeah, yeah yeah. And then

(00:55):
today we're going to get into the discriminatory and violent
tactics of the early border patrols. So fun, prepare yourself
to be mad. I can't wait for a great episode
a man, and by great, I mean that I'm going
to be angry, to be raging. Yeah. Again. Because of
the lack of formal training, Board patrol districts were left

(01:16):
to develop their own methods of enforcing immigration laws, and
one of these methods was a line watches, in which
officers physically patrolled the areas of the border of their
particular districts to apprehend quote unauthorized immigrants as they cross
into the US. But because of the great distance between
the official ports of entry and fewer than two hundred

(01:39):
officers spread across various shifts, line watching wasn't actually effective
at all, and so, in an effort to come up
with a more effective way of policing, Chester C. Courtney,
chief Patrol inspector of the Subdistrict Office in Marfa, Texas,
conducted a study and concluded that forty percent of unsanctioned

(02:01):
border crossers had evaded the line watches. Mind you, he
conducted this study of missed apprehensions by comparing the number
of people apprehended since nineteen twenty four to the growth
of the region's Mexican population. I don't understand, Okay, So

(02:22):
the way that he conducted this study by what was
by comparing the He compared the people that were apprehended
since nineteen twenty four to the how much the Mexican
population in the area grew. So he compared those two numbers, Okay,
those two numbers to come up with the percentage of

(02:46):
missed apprehensions. So like, oh, there's like eighty percent more
Mexicans here, so that means eighty percent invaded us. Yeah,
I'm making those numbers up, like you just said, obviously, Yeah,
it's sick. But also he was also making this up.
Oh shit, yeah. Yeah, So there's a lot of flaws

(03:07):
in this study, right. For starters, he didn't have the
official count of Mexican population at any point, you know,
in nineteen twenty four or after, so he didn't know
for sure how much growth there was. He just just
from his eyes, you know, just what he saw. He
was like, too many, I haven't seen those before. Yeah.

(03:32):
And uh. He also didn't have any numbers regarding how
many of those in the population were undocumented or not.
He just assumed they were because they looked Mexican, kinda
like Ice is doing today. Wow, everything repeats the sof
And yeah, he didn't know if these Mexicans came from

(03:53):
Mexico or from another state, you know what I mean,
or if they were like already there when right they
took these lands exactly. Yeah, and so yeah, he just
automatically assumed that any growth in the Mexican population meant
that they had entered the country as quote, unsanctioned border crossers.

(04:15):
And so Chester's little study showed that early on border
patrol equated illegal quote illegal border crossings to Mexicans, and
that Mexicans should be policed. And so in last episode
I mentioned that the lou Moi and hopefully I'm saying

(04:36):
that right, I don't even know. But anyway, the lou
Moi Supreme Court decision determined that a quote alien is
the act of entering the US until he reaches his
interior destination. And how this basically extended the jurisdiction of
the border patrol way beyond the border, and this would
later be unconstitutional. No, No, I thought you said that

(04:58):
about something last episod that was about one of the
Chinese inclusion laws. Oh right, pretty sure, Okay, yeah, okay,
so this still stands today, Yeah, because the border patrol
basically has jurisdiction anywhere because it's within the three hundred
miles within the border, right, I think so, But I

(05:20):
think I guess anywhere. It just would be the Midwest
because they don't have any technically a border, but now
they're just everywhere. Yeah, I mean they're everywhere, does matter? Yeah,
So in nineteen twenty seven, the Border Patrol began exercising
this jurisdiction. So they actually started moving beyond the borderline
and line watches into the greater borderlands. And so they

(05:45):
patrolled the back roads and conducted traffic stops to question people. Oh, basically,
they were policing the mobility of Mexicans because they were
not stopping white people, right right, these traffic stops that
were only asking Mexicans about where were from, where they
were born, and things like that. And now that the
officers were spending less time on the actual physical border,

(06:07):
they were unable to catch people in the act of
crossing the border quote legally, right. So they used and
this is going to sound so familiar because it's happening now,
So they used with the Supreme Court would later call
Mexican appearance as a way of identifying supposed unauthorized border crossers,

(06:29):
just like now the Supreme Court has okay racial profiling
against Latinos. They literally said it was okay if someone
was speaking Spanish, if they looked a certain way, because
that is grounds for suspicion of being here illegally. Yeah,
And just like then they okay to border patrol to say, oh,

(06:50):
this person looks Mexican. This is a man of Mexican appearance.
Let's ask him where he's from. So it's like we're
in the lasts and twenties, and you know, they were like,
this isn't Germany. This isn't nineteen forties Germany. And it's like, okay, no,
just say this isn't nineteen twenties US like, yes, this
is literally happened before.

Speaker 2 (07:11):
This isn't America. That is what.

Speaker 1 (07:14):
Shocks me because I'm like, vagrancy laws are similar to
this too, and those were mused against black people in
the South, also against Mexicans in Texas and California. Yeah yeah,
so I'm like, I don't know why the fuck well,
I talked about it in the Anti Miners Act episode,
but there was a law that preceded the Anti or

(07:39):
maybe oh my god, I'm forgetting so much. It's because
I'm sick, so you know what, I'm not gonna remember.
But there was a law called the Anti Vacrancy Act
and it was used literally just to arrest Mexicans and
police people go black people. Yeah, yeah, I'm not gonna

(08:04):
remember the other part of this. Oh okay, the anti
Greaser Act. Oh my god, that's so long, but you
got there. Yeah, the Greaser Act. You're half a brain
cell remains intact. Yeah. So. And one example of racial
profiling border patrol officers Pete Torres and miss Pedro. I

(08:31):
don't know what his name was anyway. Pete Torres, the
border patrol officer we talked about last episode who was
so opended up being called Mexican that he shot in
Quentin to call him that. Along with George Parker Junior,
We're driving around in El Paso in the El Paso
Las Cruces Highway when they spotted two Mexicans who were
heading north. So Pete turns to George and says, I

(08:53):
believe the two in that car Mexican. Let us go
and see if there are wet aliens. Wet alien Pete, Pete.
So the stop ended up turning into a bigger deal
because the two men in the car, Mariano Martinez and
Hezu's hasso And wow, the illiteration. I love that they

(09:13):
had alcohol in the car during the prohibition, so they yeah,
they were violating federal prohibition laws. And Pete and George
detained them for that and for how the case developed.
It's important to note that the agent saw a bag
of what appeared to be canned and they asked the
men what they had, and then one of them said alcohol.

(09:35):
So they admitted to having alcohol. But Mariano and Hissu's
protested their arrest, arguing that border patrol agents didn't have
the authority or reasonable evidence to investigate them for violing
federal prohibition laws. And the record of this investigation is
what allowed the actor Kelly member of on a verse
name basis right to look into the historical practice of

(09:58):
the border Patrol using wish profiling as grounds to question
people about their immigration status. Ultimately, the Commission, the Commission,
the Commission, the Commission what the Commissioner of Health p
and George's actions, including their yeah, including their use of
race to stop Mariano and Quesus. Oh my god, like
this is a Preme Court today, Mm hmmm. Yeah. And

(10:20):
so Chester Courtney, who was then the acting Chief Inspector
of War Patrol, reviewed the decision and concluded that quote
as long as patrol inspectors use their head when stopping
Mexicans to inquire into their alienage and later find Liquor
that the arrest will be upheld, but he warned his
officers that had the two persons been in white Americans,

(10:42):
the case would have been thrown out on account of
legal search, as they would have been absurd to say
they believe the Americans to be aliens. Oh wow wow
mm hmmm, and so Kelly wrote in particular, by describing
the defendant as Mexican regardless of their foremost citizenship status
while seamlessly interchanging the terms of white and American Courtney

(11:05):
reveals that border patrol tactics were profoundly shaped by the
deeper histories and broader social systems that marked Mechicanos as
marginalized and temporary outsiders within the region's duminant social, cultural, political,
and economic systems. Immigration law therefore provided the basic framework
for border patrol operations, but the histories of conquests, displacement,

(11:27):
and the rise of Jim Crow and the era of
agribusiness penetrated the border patrols everyday translations of immigration law
into immigration law enforcement practices. So like all these things
are affecting their everyday practice, resulting in the racial profiling
discrimination of Mexicans. Yeah, this racialization of who's a citizen

(11:51):
and who's automatically under suspicion of being undocumented even affected
the development of the pseudoscience of tracking, which is so
tracking was a method developed and used by war patrol
officers in which the officers read markings like broken twigs,
human litter, and footprints left by people traveling through the area.

(12:13):
And so the officers would pick up a footprint at
the border and track this person's movement inland through miles
of thick brush, mountain terrain, and open desert. That was
a Mexican foot separate there. Wait, okay, wait, you walk

(12:33):
like a Mexican basically, is what I'm gonna say right now.
So some of the border patrol men were experts in
this tracking we say experts in quotation marks. Yeah, experts
at a pseudoscience. How are you going to be expert
as something fake? Well? Wow? Well, So among them was

(12:57):
fred D Albini, who we talked about last episode. He
was one of the bullies who threw rocks at Mexican
kids growing up. Oh, when he was a kid, and
then he became Augian. Yes, I remember right, this fellow.
So Fred liked to joke around with new recruits about
his track and abilities, and he was squat over a
track horse, which I looked up and it's like this

(13:18):
contraption I don't know, okay, and trap for Mexican snow,
basically I don't know what they used it for. It's
like a like a farm thing or some shit. I
don't know. So anyway, he were like basically squat over
like acting, and then he'd be like, hmm, a Mexican
male about five five to five eight, dark brown hair,

(13:39):
brown eyes, dark complexion, wearing waatches and so on with
the stereotypical description of a Mexican man. And sorry, he
ascertained this from a footstep right ptein And so then
he would conclude like this little show by saying, when
the last tracks were found with the maker standing in them,
sure enough, that's what he looked like. And his name

(14:02):
was Juan or Jose. Yeah that's my other choice. Yeah.
So Fred also once explained it to a writer. A
Mexican always walks heavy on the outside of his feet.
When he walks, he puts his foot down on the
hill first and then rolls it off. Indians will do
that too, White and blacks ordinarily put their feet down flat. Wow.

(14:27):
And he likes seriously said this like he was serious,
he thought it was real. Wow, Like bitch, what what
do you mean delusional? Then yeah, yeah, it's like pseudoscience,
Like racial pseudoscience is stupid. Well yeah, to say the least.

(14:52):
In one instance of racial profiling, two border patrol officers
tracked a nineteen year old Jose and Nandez to a
store in Esperanta, Texas, and before leaving the store, the
officers decided to interrogate Jose about his citizenship status. So
they pulled him out of the store by force, and
they forced him into their car and drove off, accusing

(15:13):
him of entering the country legally. And they drove hoo
said to his shack where he lived, and he showed
them his baptism certificate proving he was born here in
the United States. Baptism, Yeah, I said, a baptist mos certificate. Okay,
I'm assuming because I don't know if this is the

(15:33):
nineteen twenties, not everybody was born in a hospital. True, Plus,
if you're usually baptized as a baby, so if you're like, yeah,
plus he lived in a shack, yeah, okay, and people
who were you know, of lesser means. I guess they
didn't always register their kids and get bird certificates and
blah blah all that stuff. But yeah, he had a
Baptist wallet certificate which said where he was born and

(15:56):
he was born in the United States. But the officers
were like, shut the fuck up, you said. Oh, they said,
shut up, you stid up a bitch, and they didn't
believe the certificate was valid. Oh my god. And so
then they took him by the river where they supposedly
first started tracking the foot prints that they tracked all

(16:18):
the way to the store to find him. Right, So
they took him to this foot prints and then they
compared Hosea's footprints to the foot prints on the ground, right,
and then they decided, quote, they're just the same, Yes,
you cross tonight. You sent up a bitch, Like how
are you going to compare? Like what do you mean?
And they're like, show me your papers. He showed them

(16:38):
and they're like nah, no, no. And then they took
them to this footprint and they're like these are the
same footprints. Oh my god. And I'm like, what kind
of what kind of is this? Yeah? Yeah, yeah. Also,
when the officers followed the tracks to the store, they
came upon three men, two of which they described as American,

(17:00):
so probably white. And then out of these three men,
they only decided to interge Jose. So what if they
had followed these tracks to the store and there had
been three white men, what then, you know what I mean,
what would they have done? Found magically found tracks somewhere
else to the next Mexican instead? Yeah, and so this

(17:22):
is just like today's ice, right, because we have heard
people who who have said, who have shown their documentation
their passports, have had that confiscated and still detained. And
to know that in the stupid First of all, the
Supreme Court decision was made in the shadow docket, basically,
not in the not during public hours. So it's like

(17:46):
all of a sudden, this decision was made and nobody
even knew, yeah, it was going to be decided on,
and there was no I forgot what they fucking call it,
but there was no like main reason. They didn't give
a reason. Right. The only person who wrote something was
that alleged rapists what's his name? Ye immediately yeah, and

(18:13):
in his stupid little shit that he wrote, he said
that being temporarily detained is a non issue. It's not
a big deal because you just show your proof of
citizenship and you're fine. Mind you, we know of people
that are citizens and have been detained for three weeks.

(18:33):
You're telling me that being detained for three weeks is
not a life changing event. And first of all, I
don't believe anybody should be detained agreed at detention centers,
and the conditions a detention centers are a bit horrible,
Like people are eating rotten food or they're eating like
minimal amount of food. Toilets are clogged, medicine is declined,

(18:58):
it's extremely cold, they're dying. People are dying in the
tention centers, and they have been oh for a lots
of tencher centers, as long as the tention centers have existed. Yep,
So nobody should be detained. But mind you, he's over
here trying to say, like, oh, it's not a big deal,
and yet people are being put in these conditions even
when showing their citizenship. Mm hm, so fuck you, Kevanaugh.

(19:22):
And it's funny because like he didn't need to say anything,
the dicision is made. He just wanted to show his ass.
Yeah yeah, yeah, and my like Obviously we know there's
there's why undocumented immigrants as well, But are they being
subjected to any of this? No? And were they back then? No? No?

(19:46):
So so Kelly writes that despite the Border patrols disorganization
and lack of funding, the arrival of the Border Patrol
into the borderlands introduced a legal slash illegal divide to
the areas established systems of inequity while creating a new

(20:09):
apparatus of violence and social control. So like there was
already and then we talked about that lap last episode
two and about Lulac and them trying to fit into
the racial white black divide by being trying to be white.
And so now they introduced this, you know, different system
of subjugation legal and illegal or illegal meant brown Mexicans. Yeah,

(20:36):
And while Border Patrol has targeted Mexicans basically since its inception,
it's also important to emphasize that Mexicans have always resisted
and fought back. And just to give one example, oo
Border Patrol officer EJ. Stovel described a time where he
didn't pull a gun out on a Mexican man who
was caught with beer, and then the man as soon

(20:57):
as he was caught, he like smashed the ball evidence what,
I don't have anything, But this EJ Border patrol officer
was like, well, I didn't pull out a gun on
him because I would have had fifty Mexicans on me
real quick. So there's like stories of you know, Mexican
communities and little towns surrounding others and surrounding officers. Yeah,

(21:19):
oh my god, kind of like today. Yeah yeah. And
occasionally business owners and the lead would also challenge border patrol,
but for the most part they were in league with
the border patrol and appreciated the policing of Mexican laborers
by border patrol. In the book, there's like obviously lots
of more examples, but they did talk about that the

(21:40):
store owner where Jose was interrogated and taken from he
followed the complaint against the border control but oh patrol good. Yeah. So,
with pressure from agricultural businessman, many municipalities in the Texan
borderlands passive vagrancy laws that they were in migrant workers
with the rest if they traveled to new jobs, and

(22:01):
place restrictions on out of state labor contractors, all in
efforts to stop workers from improving labor conditions. And wages,
and border patrol became just another one of their tools
in those efforts. One farmer said, we told the immigration officers,
if our Mexicans tried to get away into the interior,

(22:22):
and they stop them and send them back to Mexico,
then in a few days their back here and we
have good workers for another year. Oh it's like we
were saying in the episode where we recovered Zospigettis. Yeah,
it's these things work together against the working class. And
even now we're seeing labor organizers, activists being detained by eyes. Yeah,

(22:44):
and so that's why these things are intersectional, and like
why may date is so often tied with immigrant rights movements,
because you can have one without the other. And it
was a delicate balance for border patras to enforce immigration
while not disrupting the labor horse of the elite. And

(23:05):
it was a matter of mutual respect and benefit between everyone,
as in border patrol and the elite, everyone but the
Mexican laborers who were exploited by both border patrol and
the farmers ranchers. Right often, border patrol agents asked for
help from the ranchers and farmers, especially when facing off

(23:26):
with bandits or smugglers trafficking and alcohol during the prohibition,
who they often had violent face offs with and pretty
much used as an excuse to be indiscriminately violent to
all Mexicans. So let's get into an or I think
it's some I wrote one example, but the nikere writing,
so let me say that I go. Okay, So let's

(23:47):
get into a few examples of this. John, who for
some reason was known as Jack, and James aka Jim
Conningham were brothers from ed Fasil, Texas who worked as
merchants and then peace officers before working as mounted guard
for immigration and then border patrol wants. The mounted guard

(24:09):
you know the Chinese inspectors that I talked about before, Right, Okay,
they were basically they turned into border patrol and many
of those people became the early border patrol officers. Right.
So John was John Sush. Jack was older and he
was said to have quote limited mental facilities. Oh and

(24:30):
then and so Jim pretty much watched over him since childhood,
and they worked as a pair and always patrol together. Well,
one day Jim was shot by a Mexican smuggler and
although he did survive, he sustained pretty serious injuries, and
on the day that Jim was shot, Jack headed to

(24:51):
the border to get revenge. And while Jim was in
the hospital, reports came into the hospital that someone was
down at the bridge doing a lot of of shooting,
and when someone went down to investigate, they found Jack.
He had gone to the river where Jim was shot
and killed every person who came in sight at the
Mexican side of the river. Oh my god. Yeah, And

(25:15):
I wanted to look further into whether what happened to him,
but most of the Border patrol officers that killed Mexicans,
nothing happened to him. Yeah, yeah, so I'm sure that
was the case for Jack mm hm. Kelly noted that
Border Patrol followed in the footsteps of the Texas Rangers.

Speaker 2 (25:35):
How did I knew that name was gonna come up?

Speaker 1 (25:39):
Yeah, by engaging there in their tradition of revenge by proxy.
And I think when we talked about, well you talked
about who was that you did an episode on, it
was that guy who was basically being chased by the
Texas Rangers, Chico Cano. Yeah. So like that was the
case of Texas Rangers wanting revenge Chico Kano. Yeah, And

(26:02):
there was many stories of Texas Rangers doing that, and
so Bord Patrol they did the same ship. And you
know what I find interesting? When I posted the videos
to both TikTok and his stories known, there was at
least one comment like, oh, we'll talk about the Mexican bannis.
I'm like, why this is a video about Chico Kano Bandits.

Speaker 2 (26:23):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (26:24):
Like, bitch, like, oh well, don't forget about the bandits.
I don't care. I don't care about that. Did you
talk about the bandits if that's your worry, Okay, if
you want to. It's like, it's that's what's been talked about,
that's been the narrative. Yeah, so why am I going
to repeat their narrative? But what man? I don't think so,

(26:46):
I don't think so. I'm not going to share the
narrative in the Texas Rangers Museum. If you want to
know about the bandits, go to the Texas Ranger Museum.
I'm sure you'll read all the text Rangers fucking killed.
Since you want to learn so much about Mexicans being killed? Here, No,
the other way around. Not here, bitch, in this house,

(27:08):
we don't give one fuck. Where was I? Oh? Yeah,
so these quests of revenge were common, just as they
were for the Texas Rangers, and it was also common
for mobs to form with participation of the ranchers and
community members and Border Patrol. Well yeah it was. It

(27:30):
was border Patrol forming these mobs with oh yeah, my bad. No,
that might have been my bad. I don't know, who knows.
So one example of this, Lawn Parker, was a Border
Patrol officer who was killed while engaging with smugglers. And
a few days after Lawn's death, a new officer, Alvin

(27:51):
Edward Moore, was given land I can't wanting to call
him Lonnie, sorry. He was given Lawns badge and told
story of the smuggler who killed him and got away
with it. I see they could have just given him
the badge and not said anything. But no, that doesn't
push a little tradition of violence. It's part of the tradition.

(28:12):
Are blood hungry, yeah, and uh thirsty for killing Mexicans.
So yep, they have to keep this going. So when
Alvin got word of where the smuggler was, he gathered
fellow officers, farmers, and ranchers, basically a mob, a mob, yeah,
to avenge Lawn's death and Lawn's partner Albert So Albert
was leading the mob, and after deputizing the farmers and ranchers,

(28:34):
he told the men, all I've got to say, men
is when you see anybody coming toward the line tonight,
yell at him in English and if you don't answer
you in English, shoot. And this lure of Lawn kept
being used as an excuse to exact violence against Mexicans.

(28:56):
So angry. Yeah, that night of the mob, the man
that was accused of having shot having shot and killed
the Lan, Domitilio, had been shot and survived and was
later sentenced to death. So this was the man that was,
you know, allegedly responsible for the killing of Lan. But
actually years later Ralph Williams, who was related to Lan

(29:19):
by marriage, joined the Board patrol. And this was years
after Lan you know, was killed and Domitillio had been
sentenced to death and supposedly kisal problem solved, you know, right,
So anyway, he vowed to avenge Lanz murder. But like
Lan legend murder, No you don't understand. Yeah, Actually it

(29:42):
was more it was it was a different guy. It
was a different Mexican. According to these people. They just
wanted to kill Mexicans. So uh okay, so yeah, Ralph
vtual avenged Lanz murder and Ralph along with a sheriff,
Nate Jim, who was Lown's nephew and coincidentally grew up

(30:05):
with the other fellows that I talked about during Rocks
and Mexican kids doing the same thing. What are go incidence? Yeah?
Uh so uh they killed two Mexican men who they
believed were responsible for Lawn's death, even though the man
allegedly already responsible had already been sentenced and had already
been killed because of that sentence. Yeah, yeah, wow, And

(30:33):
the legend of Lawn continued.

Speaker 2 (30:36):
No, how they love to beat? What is that saying?
Beat a horse deadd Is that's it?

Speaker 1 (30:43):
Right? Yeah? I think so? Are they not doing that
right now with a certain someone? They're beating that ship
to death? That horse? Whatever is the saying?

Speaker 2 (30:53):
Say?

Speaker 1 (30:54):
Yeah? Yeah? And so yeah?

Speaker 2 (30:58):
Wait wait sorry, is it beat up a horse?

Speaker 1 (31:00):
It beat it? I don't know the quo. I don't
know the same. I'm sorry, we don't say the don't
I don't know. Be a dead horse to death? Is
that it? No? That's I think it's just beat a
dead horse. Oh, beat a dead horse to death. It's
already dead. He's dead at chad Walmar Oh okay, okay,

(31:21):
So yeah, they love doing that ship they really do.
They really do. I'm gonna try to remember that one.
So yeah. The legend of Lawn continued, and by nineteen
twenty six, seven men had been killed and one man
was in jail, and all in the name of avenging

(31:42):
Lawn's death, even though lns Yans killer had already been
sentenced and to death. Yeah, anything to keep up this,
Laura and miss it's all fake. It's all appearance. Fuck you, Lan.

(32:04):
I'm just I fucking can't believe they they just kept
this up. That's crazy, so Kelly wrote. In the battles
that ensued between border patrol officers and mexicanos, school yard
clashes were replayed between grown men, but the white boys
who had become border patrol officers had gained the authority
of the state. That's so dangerous and the state to

(32:28):
kill Mexicans with impunity. Yep, and that's like there, that's
like a dream come true for them. Oh yeah, I
am sure they would love to do that again. I'm
so sure. And you know what, it's getting there. It's
getting there. Yeah, because we have heard of people dying
while running away from from ice. And what are the

(32:50):
fucking responses from these heartless uh dumbasses. Oh well, maybe
he should have ran away. Oh if he was scared,
I'll be maybe me there, shout the fuck up. It's
always the same fucking bullshit.

Speaker 2 (33:04):
Oh.

Speaker 1 (33:05):
Oh, if they didn't want to be detained, they shouldn't
have come. Oh why don't they put their keys to that?

Speaker 2 (33:09):
Shot up?

Speaker 1 (33:11):
Shut up?

Speaker 2 (33:12):
Do you know?

Speaker 1 (33:12):
How do you know how mines work? Minds with ancestral knowledge,
with ties to this land, They don't think in borders.
Borders are not real. You made them speed up, and
now we can't walk across the walk across all the time. No,
but really no ya, but I was gonna say, you

(33:35):
don't even have to go and use today as an example.
There was that case where the border patrol agents shot
into Mexico. Oh my god, killed the kid, Yeah in Mexico. Yeah,
got off free and he's probably retired receiving pay. Got
to live to a happy, unhappy, old fucking age. This

(33:57):
was like, no, this was like in twentyeight I'm not old. No,
this was like post it was maybe like twenty fifteen
something like that.

Speaker 2 (34:07):
Yeah, we covered it on his book, Tael, We're on
his Hoetels.

Speaker 1 (34:10):
Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (34:11):
And that guy's name was Lonnie something.

Speaker 1 (34:12):
Oh my god, I hear that name. One more tired.
But they and it was it went to the No,
that didn't go to the Supreme Court. At the same time,
there was a Supreme Court case being heard of the
Supreme Court case, and that case determined that like basically
they could just get away with this, leaving the family

(34:33):
of the boy in Mexico to have no more recourse
for justice. Yeah. So this is again killing with that
impunity or sorry, with impunity, how without with with with Yeah,
I'm just like, I'm just like sick of this. So.
Another legendary figure in early border patrol culture is Charles

(34:53):
Askins Junior, who was known as known as one of
the twentieth century's greatest gunfighter. And obviously he was a
barb troupser. You're right, right. So when Charles died, in
obituary in the American Handgunner described him as a stone

(35:15):
cold killer. For those of those of us who knew him,
there was no dental way to put it, and this
was a barb trouser, a stone cold killer, very huge
red flag. Oh yeah, what's worse than a red flag?
A glaring red flag, that's what this is. So Charles

(35:42):
himself said his official body count was twenty seven, not
counting blacks than Mexicans. Who was he killing then? And
this was a presumably white people he killed, Oh my god,
and he was and who knows how many black people
and Mexicans. And also I've been saying blacks. That's how
they the codes are. I don't say. Yeah, that's like

(36:03):
a weird thing to say. Yeah, that is a weird
thing to say. You know what I did see a
video recircling or circulating around of a starting someone that
passed away recently, was someone that was killed recently, right right, yeah,
and at an event they're like blacks, and I'm like, oh,
oh yeah, he said it all the time. Yeah yeah,

(36:23):
and that like people know not to say that right
in red flag? Yeah you don't. Yeah, come on, it's
like they say that instead of the N word. That
was intentional. Yeah yeah. So Charles also once said I
was really in favor of banging a suspect over the
years with a six shooter and then asking him when

(36:43):
he crossed out of Mexico. This I found reduced a
small talk to a few syllables and got to convence
a confession in short order. Okay, this fucking bitch so
a big strong man with the gun. Yeah, And we
should note that in nineteen thirty, That's Department of Labor
started to investigate corruption and excessive violence within the Border Patrol,

(37:06):
and part of this involved compiling a list of all
criminal convictions filed against Border Patrol officers since July nineteen
twenty four. Mind you, they were created in March nineteen
twenty four, so they started getting arrested a few months later. Wow,
And they found from this list, they found that officers
had been charged and convicted of everything from murder to speeding.

(37:29):
So some people did actually get convicted. Some officers did.
But murder was this within their duties as a borboso
agent or outside of being a borbitual agent. They just
like kind of a fight and killed someone. It doesn't differentiate.
So I'm not sure. Okay, that's both because I feel
like the odds of being convicted and there's a speculation

(37:51):
of course, because I didn't look into this, but I
feel like the odds of them getting convicted is because
they were like in a bar fight and they killed them,
white dude, not exactly what I was thinking. Yeah, if
there's criminal charges, it's because someone was like, yeah, let's
charge them, and that wouldn't be happening if we're talking
about migrants crossing the border, thenna, they're not gonna cress charges.

(38:15):
What charges like?

Speaker 2 (38:17):
So yeah.

Speaker 1 (38:18):
So then in nineteen thirty three there was some reorganization
and this is where we get the ins the Immigration
and Naturalization Service, which the Board Patrol was now under,
and the Dinis then tried to clean ship. And I
think that's how the saying goes, right. I think that's
the right thing. Okay, Yeah, So they tried to clean
things out by firing all officers and rehiring them only

(38:41):
on a temporary basis. And in order to get highed permanently,
the officers had to appear before a board of officials,
which came to be known as the Benzene Board, and
the goal of the board was to cut out officers
who were prone to violence and use their guns too quickly. Okay,
but oh, oh my god, I was gonna say that

(39:01):
sounds like a good thing. I mean, you know, it
is a good thing on paper, But men like Charles
Askins Junior made it through the board. So they just
presented well and made it through. I guess, Oh my god,
this is the men that killed twenty seven people, not
counting black people in Mexicans. Yeah, oh my god. Yeah.

(39:22):
And there were a lot of different reasons for men
like Charles Atkins being rehired permanently. And some of those
reasons is that the board relied on law enforcement for
their investigations, and law enforcesal we're going to investigate ourselves. Yeah,
law enforcement they were just as corrupt and they often

(39:42):
aided and carving up murders by Board patrol. So that's,
you know, one of the reasons. And also the Great
Depression happened shortly after, and so you know a lot
of things were in the mix. And yeah, for nineteen
thirty three, I guess we'll leave things off there. Okay, wow,

(40:03):
well thanks for getting us up to nineteen thirty three
and telling me more. We might go back in time.
I'm not sure, we'll see, but this is where we're
leaving off for now. We'll see where the next part
takes us. Yeah. Actually, yeah, nineteen thirty to the training,

(40:23):
they started a training school. Oh okay, then an effort
to also make things like you know, is that training
goes still around now, isn't it. I believe so. Yeah,
And they're trained by the IDEF at the School of
America's which has since been renamed and relocated. Actually I
think it was just renamed. I think it's self forbetting anyway. Okay,

(40:49):
well thanks for that, And do we have anything else
to add before? I don't think so. Oh wait, I
have something to add. Oh yes, I do. Actually have
one more thing to add. If you are in Washington,

(41:09):
no matter where in Washington you are, drive to Yakama.
On November first, twenty twenty five. Carmen and I are
doing an event, The Kukuo is Going to Get You
featuring us and Jora Tempees from Latinos against Poogish Saturday,
November first, twenty twenty five. Doors open at six thirty.
Tickets are on sale. The link is in the show notes.

(41:31):
And it's gonna be a good time. We're gonna be
telling scary stories. There's gonna be a spooky mercado, There's
going to be food, so yeah, it's gonna be a
good time. Yeah. We're gonna be there in a spooky capacity,
not in a history capacity. Yeah. So either way though,
it's gonna be good. It's gonna be a good time,
So come join us. Yeah. Yeah. Also, really quick, I

(41:53):
wanted to mention I checked our reviews on Apple Podcasts
and we have one more review from August from eaties
who said You're something the best. Thank you very much,
itdies for your five star rating and review. Oh my gosh,
hearts hearts, thank you. And yeah, this brings us to
the end of the episode and we hope this was

(42:14):
one lass Estoria Unknown for you. Bye bye. Estoria Unknown
is produced by Carmen and Christina, researched by Carmen and Christina,
edited by Christina. You can find sources for every episode
at Estoriasunknown dot com and in our show notes. Creating
the podcast has a lot of work, so if you
want to help us out financially, you can do so

(42:34):
by supporting us on Patreon at Patreon dot com. Slash
studio as an own podcast

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