El Centro, California - United States Border Patrol agents within the El Centro Sector area of operations continue to demonstrate a high level of law enforcement achievements along the 70 linear miles of International Boundary shared with Mexico from the Jacumba Mountains in the west to the Imperial Sand Dunes in the east during fiscal year 2014.
El Centro Sector now employs over 1,100 uniformed agents assigned to 3 line-watch stations in El Centro, Calexico, and Indio. This is a significant increase in deployment of personnel when compared to the staffing levels of 1996, when El Centro Sector had approximately 189 agents.
In fiscal year 2014, El Centro Sector Border Patrol continued with the 2012-2016 risk-based strategy utilizing the three pillars of information, integration, and rapid response maintaining a level of effective border control while still building on the foundation of the previous strategy. Effective control was obtained by identifying cross-border threats, intelligence gathering, utilizing and maximizing partnerships with federal, state, and local agencies, and deploying a rapid response to mitigate cross-border threats quickly and effectively.
“These significant enforcement accomplishments are a direct reflection of the tireless efforts of the uniformed men and women of the El Centro Sector, who carry out the crucial mission of protecting the borders of the United States,” said Carla L. Provost, Chief Patrol Agent of the El Centro Sector. “We will continue to improve our abilities to target criminal organizations and defeat threats to the security of the American public and our communities.”
From Oct. 1, 2013 through Sept. 30, 2014, El Centro Sector Border Patrol accomplishments included the apprehension of 14,511 persons for illegal entry into the country. This is a decrease of illegal entry attempts of 11 percent, resulting from a more risk based approach and rapid response to changing threats along the border compared to fiscal year 2013. Since fiscal year 2011, apprehensions in El Centro Sector have not exceeded 30,000.
Nationwide, the United States Border Patrol apprehended 486,651 persons; El Centro Sector apprehensions accounted for 2.9 percent of this total. Overall apprehensions for fiscal year 2014 along the southwest border with Mexico were 479,371. El Centro Sector accounted for 3.9 percent of those apprehensions.
El Centro Sector Border Patrol agents seized 5,713 pounds of marijuana, a 2.2 percent decrease over fiscal year 2013. However, cocaine seizures increased 32.7 percent to 148 pounds; methamphetamine seizures increased 11.25 percent to 445 pounds; and heroin seizures increased 214 percent to over 2,985 ounces.
There were a total of 1,920,411 pounds of marijuana, over 4,443 pounds of cocaine, 3,770 pounds of methamphetamine, and 9,204 ounces of heroin seized along the southwest border by the United States Border Patrol.
The focused enforcement efforts of El Centro Sector Border Patrol agents accounted for 3.3 percent of the cocaine, 11.8 percent of the methamphetamine, and 32.4 percent of the heroin seized by the U.S. Border Patrol nationwide.
These results did not come without significant challenges and enormous dangers. In El Centro Sector there were a total of 28 assaults on agents while in the performance of their duties. Unfortunately, this was an increase of 33 percent from the prior fiscal year.
This fiscal year El Centro Sector Border Patrol agents conducted 12 rescue missions compared to 9 missions last fiscal year.
El Centro Sector Border Patrol agents processed a total of 665 unaccompanied alien children (UAC) this fiscal year, a 54.6 percent increase from last fiscal year. Along the southwest border there were a total of 68,541 UAC’s apprehended; El Centro Sector accounted for .97 percent of this total.
