Migrants fled a shelter in Nogales, Mexico, after it was raided and robbed by police—revealing the corruption and impunity that plagues this border town.
On October 10, a binational march took place along the U.S.-Mexico boundary in Ambos Nogales to commemorate the murder of José Antonio Elena Rodríguez by the U.S. Border Patrol one year ago.
Taide Elena continues to fight for justice, six months after the U.S. Border Patrol shot and killed her 16-year-old grandson, José Antonio Elena Rodriguez, in Nogales, Sonora.
On February 7, authorities released the autopsy report of 16-year-old Nogales, Sonora resident José Antonio Elena Rodriguez, painting a troubling picture of the tragic events of the evening of October 10, when a U.S. Border Patrol agent, firing from the United States, killed the teenager.
On November 2, high above Nogales, Sonora at the Colinas del Buen Pastor cemetery, Taide Elena placed two lit candles on the grave of her grandson, 16-year-old José Antonio Elena Rodríguez. It was the Day of the Dead in Nogales, and a binational procession remembered his life and demanded justice after the Border Patrol shot and killed him on October 10.
On October 10, a U.S Border Patrol agent shot through an opening in the boundary wall and killed José Antonio Elena Rodriguez, 16, in Nogales, Sonora. While the circumstances surrounding the incident remain fuzzy, the shooting appears to have been both unnecessary and easily avoidable. Moreover, it highlights the urgent need to de-escalate the multifaceted “war” in the borderlands and to demilitarize the region.
It’s a steamy, overcast monsoon morning in Nogales, Sonora, just across the border from the United States. I’ve come to learn more about what happens to Mexican deportees, many parents of children, who are left off by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in downtown Nogales at two in the morning.
A recent visit to Nogales, Arizona, and to the U.S. Border Patrol station there—the country's largest—brings home the dramatic transformation of the U.S.-Mexico borderlands over the last couple of decades. It also illustrates how U.S. authorities are envisioning and laying the groundwork for a "war" without end against what they construct as an endless supply of threats emanating from the Mexican side of the international divide.
