CHARLIE NEUMAN /
Union-Tribune Increased fear
among immigrant families of roving Border Patrol agents has
kept some people from riding buses, shopping or going to a
Laundromat on North Santa Fe Avenue in Vista yesterday, where
Juana Alvarez (left) and Margarita Jimenez were washing
clothes.
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VISTA – It
was visibly quieter yesterday, with fewer men looking for work on
street corners, fewer women with strollers on the sidewalks, and
business unusually slow at the grocery store and Laundromat.
Recent arrests of illegal immigrants by the Border Patrol have
families on edge in North County, and they are staying home more for
fear of being caught, many said yesterday.
Some business owners said they are feeling the pinch from fewer
shoppers, and immigrant laborers said it is getting more difficult
to look for work.
Workers say they pray before heading out to the streets.
"I'm only out here because I need the work," said Fernando
Martinez, 22, one of about a dozen day laborers lined up along South
Santa Fe Avenue outside a Vons grocery store yesterday in Vista.
"I think, 'Gee, is that (the Border Patrol) in the car?' "
Martinez said. "And if by the end of the day they didn't get me, I
think, 'I am free for another day.' "
Martinez said he helps support seven siblings in Mexico.
So far this month, roving Border Patrol agents working mainly in
San Bernardino, Riverside and northern San Diego counties have
picked up more than 300 illegal immigrants, a Border Patrol
spokesman said Monday.
CHARLIE NEUMAN /
Union-Tribune Three men
waited for work yesterday in front of the Vons supermarket on
South Santa Fe Avenue in Vista. Recent arrests of illegal
immigrants by the Border Patrol have many day laborers staying
home for fear of being caught.
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"Every day they're picking
people up," said a group of workers gathered yesterday in Escondido,
speaking almost in unison.
Mexican President Vicente Fox issued a statement yesterday from
Mexico City that said, in part: "I have instructed the minister of
Foreign Relations to express our most energetic protest to the
departments of state and homeland security for the roundups that our
compatriots have been subjected to."
Day laborers in Escondido no longer line Quince Street between
Washington Avenue and Valley Parkway because they fear la
migra, the Border Patrol, they said.
Some of them gather instead underneath an awning at the nearby
Interfaith Community Services' day labor hiring center. They said
the shade inside a private property might give them slight
protection.
"Nobody can go outside (on the street)," said Ivan Alvarez of
Tijuana. "They take you. . . . It's a big problem."
Immigrants said Spanish-language television and newspapers alert
them daily that agents are picking up a large number of illegal
immigrants in Escondido. They also know of friends and family
members who have been picked up in Carlsbad, Oceanside and Vista.
"They're making their way down the state," said a day laborer
named Jorge, who did not want to be fully identified for fear of
being deported.
Increased fear among families has kept some people from riding
buses, shopping or going to church, many immigrants said.
"I shop for my friend Alma because she is afraid to go to El
Torito," a popular Mexican grocery store, said Maria Sosa, 40, an
immigrant who is now a U.S. citizen in Vista.
Sosa carries her driver license with her always in case
authorities ask her for identification, she said.
"Alma makes a list for me and I get her groceries because she has
two daughters and she doesn't want to be caught," Sosa said. "She
feels like she can't do anything. It makes me sad."
Sosa was washing clothes inside a near-empty Laundromat on North
Santa Fe Avenue in Vista, where two women doing laundry said the
place was unusually empty.
"Usually there are more people here at this hour," said Marta
Alvarez, folding clothes with his 2-year-old son, Jonathan. "But
everybody keeps hearing about it on TV, so how can you blame them?"
The conspicuous absences evoke images from the current film "A
Day Without a Mexican," in which California wakes up one day without
one-third of its population.
In Carlsbad, Carlos Mendez, 45, a day laborer from Mexico City,
said fewer people have shown up to try to find work off El Camino
Real near the popular "chicken" market, where he was one of two men
looking for work.
The busy street once lined all day with workers is now empty by
lunchtime. Workers also stay away between 9 and 10 a.m. Saturday
mornings when agents like to stop by, they said.
The men recite the places where friends have been caught by
Border Patrol agents recently: "the buses, the swap meet, the store,
here."
Immigrants say the Border Patrol has increased its enforcement
presence over the past three months.
Even at the end of the day, workers said they have to be watchful
on their way home.
"It's hide-and-seek," said Escondido worker Ramiro
Solorio-Alvarado.
Workers say Escondido police officers assist the Border Patrol,
sometimes summoning agents after detaining people.
Escondido police Lt. David Mankin said police are not helping the
Border Patrol round up suspected illegal immigrants.
"Occasionally when we stop somebody and we have a problem with
translation, we'll call the Border Patrol to assist with
translation," Mankin said.
He also said officers will call the Border Patrol after stopping
someone and determining he or she is in the country illegally.
The increased patrolling has some businesses taking note.
Estela Gordillo, an assistant manager at El Tigre Foods grocery
store in Escondido, said sales have gone down since the Border
Patrol increased its enforcement.
"Just this morning we saw them chasing a guy" across the street,
Gordillo said.
She said agents have followed two men into the store and arrested
them at the deli counter.
"Some of our customers are telling us they don't want to come" to
the store anymore, because they are afraid.
Enlace staff writer Norma de la Vega contributed to
this report.
Elena Gaona: (760) 476-8239; elena.gaona@uniontrib.com
