Migrants charged with storming border in El Paso are RELEASED after local DA failed to file paperwork to keep them behind bars
Some of the migrants accused of planning and carrying out a March 21 riot at the border in El Paso where they overpowered and attacked members of the Texas National Guard have now been released after being released on a legal technicality released.
At least 70 migrants were charged in connection with the March 21 riot, in which 600 people stormed a border gate, attacked law enforcement officers and climbed barbed wire.
Many were held in El Paso but were released this weekend after District Attorney Bill Hicks’ office failed to file the necessary paperwork needed to keep them in custody.
“It does not appear that these cases will be filed anytime soon because they do not appear to be in the district attorney’s office,” Magistrate Judge Humberto Acosta said during the online teleconference hearing, according to local station KFOX.
“So if the prosecutor indicates that they are not ready to move forward, we are going to release these individuals on our own initiative.”
A group of about 600 migrants who entered the U.S. illegally rushed across the border in El Paso, Texas, on March 21
A migrant observes others breaching the concertina wire on the Rio Grande in El Paso, Texas, on Thursday, March 21. The migrants hoped to be processed by the border police regarding asylum applications
About 600 migrants who breached barriers on the Rio Grande in El Paso
During the hearing, Assistant District Attorney Ashley Martinez confirmed that the district attorney’s office did not have any of the felony cases on the docket for the hearing.
The Public Prosecution Service was not immediately available for comment.
El Paso District Attorney Bill Hicks was appointed to the position by Gov. Greg Abbott after previous District Attorney Yvonne Rosales resigned as she faced allegations of incompetence in 2022.
District Attorney Bill Hicks is a Republican who was appointed to the office in 2022 by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott.
Hicks is currently running for office.
Some migrants would remain behind bars if a federal immigration freeze blocks their release, court officials said Sunday.
A new hearing for more suspects is expected on Monday.
At least one migrant has been charged with attacking a Texas National Guardsman during last week’s stampede in El Paso, which federal authorities say was orchestrated by a handful of “leaders.”
Junior Evaristo-Benitez, 21, of Honduras, was taken into custody and charged with assault on a public servant, a third-degree felony, a Texas Department of Public Safety spokesperson confirmed.
He remains in jail after his bond was denied, court records show.
He is now being held in the El Paso County Jail.
PHOTO: Junior Evaristo-Benitez, 21, of Honduras, was taken into custody and charged with assault on a public servant, a third-degree felony, a Texas Department of Public Safety spokesperson confirmed.
Members of the Texas National Guard are working with Border Patrol to coordinate migrants who have crossed the border from Mexico and made their way through concertina wire as they await processing by the Border Patrol while being stopped on the U.S. side of the Rio Grande , in El Paso, Texas
Migrants breach infrastructure set up by the Texas National Guard on the Rio Grande in El Paso, Texas on Thursday
Six hundred migrants, mostly made up of single adult men from Venezuela, stormed authorities Thursday morning, breaking through barbed wire barriers and overwhelming guards who tried to prevent the migrants from handing themselves over to U.S. Border Patrol near the border wall.
Federal authorities are seeking criminal charges against about a dozen illegal immigrants who led a wild and chaotic riot, as they were identified through law enforcement cameras.
“Those people were not trying to enter the country peacefully; they stormed the gates,” Texas Congressman Tony Gonzales, who represents East El Paso, said in a telephone interview Friday.
“What do you think they’re going to do when they’re released across the country?”
The migrants had tried to storm the border on Wednesday evening, throwing rocks at members of the Texas National Guard, but eventually dispersed, another source explained.
A migrant shows an injury he claimed to have suffered after a Texas National Guardsman forced him to return south from the barrier set up by the Texas National Guard on the Rio Grande in El Paso, Texas
Migrant families who were part of the 600-strong gang are awaiting processing by U.S. Border Patrol
“There were probably only about a dozen ring leaders and the rest (of the migrants) just followed,” a law enforcement source explained.
About 600 migrants were taken into custody by U.S. Border Patrol when it was all said and done, but the vast majority will not face charges.
“There should be repercussions for people who break the law,” Gonzales added.
‘This is wrong. This is wrong on all levels.”
Tensions had increased since Wednesday evening in the run-up to the riot.
Some troublemakers had planned to get past the guards and started throwing stones at the soldiers.
However, the migrants dispersed and returned the next morning.
The migrants were already in the US because they had already crossed the international border, which is a few hundred meters south of the border wall.
Many of these asylum-seeking migrants had chosen not to surrender immediately because this is a known place to surrender to U.S. Border Patrol agents as they were in limbo due to a Texas law SB4.
The controversial law authorizes state and local police in the Lone Star State to arrest illegal immigrants, a right reserved only for federal officials such as the U.S. Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
The law, which has been banned several times in recent days by federal courts, was then allowed to take effect for a few hours on Tuesday before being blocked again on Tuesday evening.
The legal whiplash left many migrants unsure what would happen to them if they surrendered to Border Patrol.
The crowd camped in the no man’s land between the Rio Grande, north of the river that divides the US and Mexico.
The river is the international border, not the border wall.
On Thursday morning, the migrants climbed the fencing in coordination and ran to the border wall, presumably turning themselves in by force.