DACA pair arrested for human smuggling

San Diego -- Two DACA dudes, one who's under the Deferred Action of Childhood Arrivals program and the other whose DACA protection expired, were busted on suspicion of human smuggling in two separate incidents last week.

The program gave illegal immigrants who were brought here as children 2-year renewable permits protecting them from deportation and allowing them to take jobs away from Americans.

The thinking about these DACA recipients is that they're not responsible for the behavior of their parent(s). It's analogous to the idea that if your parent steals a computer from someone and gets caught and is sent to jail, his child gets to keep the computer.

President Trump announced in September the program would end in March 2018. 

The first arrest occurred on Wednesday near Torrey Pines State Beach after border agents were sent there after a resident spotted what appeared to be a smuggling incident, federal officials said.

After further investigation, agents spotted a vehicle suspected of being involved and pulled it over on Interstate 5, near Dairy Mart Road around 12:00 noon.

Officers found three men inside: the driver, a 20-year-old DACA recipient whose status had expired, and two Mexican nationals, ages 21 and 22, suspected of being in the country illegally.

The driver and his cousin, the 22-year-old passenger, told federal agents they had been involved in human smuggling in the area. The driver, who may not have been aware that Barack Obama is no longer the President, was taken into federal custody.

The second incident occurred on Thursday around 8 a.m. Two folks were arrested by Border Patrol agents in East County on suspicion they were in the US illegally when the agents saw two suspicious vehicles on Buckman Springs Road in Campo.

The agents followed one of the vehicles, a blue Honda sedan, and stopped it at a checkpoint where they conducted an immigration inspection.

The drive, a 22-year-old Mexican national who lived in Riverside County as a DACA recipient, eventually admitted to agents that he and another driver were scouting the area to help a group of smugglers, federal officials said.

This man also committed other acts of human smuggling and is currently in the custody of the Department of Homeland Security and awaiting removal proceedings.

Agents later arrested another man, a 25-year-old US citizen, who is also suspected to be part of the smuggling scheme.



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