At least 87 migrants have died in 2021 while trying to cross from the Mexican border state of Coahuila to Texas. Most were drownings, including cases where bodies are partially eaten by alligators.
The most recent fatalities took place this past weekend when authorities found the bodies of three unidentified migrants. One apparently died several days before the discovery. Coahuila emergency response officials say the drowned migrants include two men and a woman. The bodies were found on the banks of the Rio Grande, east of Piedras Negras.
Year-to-date, authorities recorded 87 migrant deaths in Coahuila–an exponentially higher running total compared to 17 during the same time span in 2020.
Coahuila is one of the hotspots in the current immigration crisis as human smugglers tied to the Cartel Del Noreste faction of Los Zetas are able to exploit the lacking physical barriers to Texas each day. The Rio Grande is often the only obstacle to move migrants. Human smugglers coach migrants on how to request asylum or navigate the U.S. immigration system to be released.
Editor’s Note: Breitbart Texas traveled to the Mexican States of Tamaulipas, Coahuila, and Nuevo León to recruit citizen journalists willing to risk their lives and expose the cartels silencing their communities. The writers would face certain death at the hands of the various cartels that operate in those areas including the Gulf Cartel and Los Zetas if a pseudonym were not used. Breitbart Texas’ Cartel Chronicles are published in both English and in their original Spanish. This article was written by “J.M. Martinez” and “C.E. Herrera” from Coahuila.
