An illegal immigrant arrested on multiple criminal trespassing charges in a Texas border county walked out of jail and disappeared after someone paid his $25,000 bail in cash.
The incident indicates that some foreign nationals crossing into Texas unlawfully have no intention of seeking asylum and are often involved in illicit business, said Kinney County Attorney Brent Smith.
People caught coming and going across the border multiple times are often involved in cartel- or gang-related activity, Mr. Smith told The Epoch Times.
The high bail set for the class A misdemeanor case isn’t an isolated occurrence on the border, he said.
A woman was arrested recently for smuggling illegal immigrants in her vehicle, he said. She had two other smuggling charges pending in another Texas county.
The jude for Kinney County set her bail at $1 million because she was a flight risk, Mr. Smith said.
Suzanne West, district attorney for Kinney County, Val Verde County, and Terrell County, recalled several cases where a large cash bail was paid by inmates charged with felonies.
“There are generally a large number of absconders from Operation Lone Star,” she told The Epoch Times.
Criminal trespass arrests are part of Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s Operation Lone Star, which is a grant funding program launched to deter and prosecute illegal immigrants.
Judges can consider previous criminal history when setting bail, which can result in a higher bail.
The $25,000 bail was set in Ulises Silva Casillas’s case because he had been arrested a dozen times on the same offense, Mr. Smith said.
County records show the Mexican national, 29 at the time of arrest, was arrested on July 18, 2022, for criminal trespass with four other men in their 20s at 3:12 a.m. on a private ranch near the border.
The accused filled out an affidavit of indigence, indicating he worked as a farmer for $250 per month.
On July 21, 2022, a woman paid his full bail in cash, and he was released under the proviso he'd attend his court date.
Almost a year later, he didn’t show up for a June 1, 2023, hearing, and an arrest warrant was issued for his failure to appear.
Sometimes, one person will show up with as much as $100,000 cash in hand and pay the bonds for several illegal immigrants being held in jail, Mr. Smith said.
Cartels will often loan money to those making bail using the title to their houses in Mexico and cars as collateral.
So far, there have been some 5,000 misdemeanor criminal trespass arrests in the county under Operation Lone Star since June of 2021, he said.
The wide-open border has caused an avalanche of criminal charges overall, he said. In 2020, the total criminal charges for felonies and misdemeanors in the county were around 200, he said.
Last year, that number increased to almost 7,000, he said, and includes single smuggling incidents that resulted in multiple charges.
Of those arrested on charges connected to illegal immigration into the United States, Mr. Smith estimates that 40 percent have been arrested multiple times over the past few years.
Arrests for trespassing in Kinney County have decreased recently as state law enforcement resources are stretched out across multiple counties, more so now than when the operation began.
“While our arrest numbers are down, the criminal trespass isn’t necessarily down,” he said. It just means the illegal immigrants aren’t being caught. “We have a lot of gotaways here.”
According to an April release from Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s office, Operation Lone Star has resulted in the arrest of more than 500,000 illegal immigrants and more than 41,00 criminal arrests, resulting in 37,600 felony charges.
Texas law enforcement has seized more than 475 million lethal doses of fentanyl, according to the governor’s office.
The Biden administration contends the crisis is part of globalized migration that isn’t the result of executive branch policy.
The Biden administration has sued Texas repeatedly over the state’s efforts to erect barriers and stop what the Texas governor has called an “invasion” of illegal immigrants across the U.S. southern border.
“If the Biden administration would put that time into securing the border, as opposed to stopping Texas from securing the border, we wouldn’t have a problem,” Mr. Abbott said in a recent statement.
