Three Army soldiers based at Fort Cavazos, Texas have been charged in a conspiracy to smuggle undocumented immigrants after they were caught driving noncitizens from Mexico and Guatemala at the southern border, according to the Department of Justice.
Emilio Mendoza Lopez, Angel Palma and Enrique Jauregui have been charged with one count of bringing in and harboring aliens, with Palma and Jauregui also facing a charge of assaulting a federal agent, the U.S. Attorney’s Office announced Wednesday.
The three men were caught after Mendoza Lopez and Palma allegedly were driving with one Mexican national and two Guatemalan nationals in their vehicle on Nov. 27 when a U.S Border Patrol (USBP) agent stopped them in Presidio, a town that sits on the U.S.-Mexico border.
As the agent approached the mens’ vehicle, they fled and struck a USBP vehicle, injuring an agent inside, according to the filed criminal complaint.
Authorities eventually stopped the vehicle and apprehended four individuals – Mendoza Lopez and the three undocumented noncitizens. The driver, alleged to be Palma, “fled on foot and was located the following day at a hotel in Odessa,” the DOJ said.
The DOJ accuses Mendoza Lopez and Palma of traveling nearly 500 miles from Fort Cavazos to Presidio “for the purpose of picking up and transporting undocumented noncitizens.”
The third individual, Jauregui, is allegedly the recruiter and facilitator of the human smuggling conspiracy, with prosecutors pointing to messages found on Palma’s phone revealing conversations between the three soldiers to collaborate on the smuggling operation.
Palma and Jauregui were both arrested Tuesday at Fort Cavazos, formerly known as Fort Hood, near Killeen, Texas.
A request for comment from Fort Cavazos was not immediately returned to The Hill.
USA Today reported that all three soldiers are assigned to the 3rd Cavalry Regiment, with Palma, of McFarland, Calif., serving as an infantryman; Jauregui, from Tacoma, Wash., serving as a Stryker systems maintainer; and Mendoza Lopez, of Bensenville, Ill. working as a wheeled vehicle mechanic.
The third-largest U.S. military base, Fort Cavazos covers 340 square miles and has nearly 60,000 direct employees, more than 38,600 of which are active-duty military personnel, according to the Texas Comptroller.
The military instillation has had a troubled history of high homicide, suicide and sexual assault among its troops, most notably the case of Army Spc. Vanessa Guillen. Guillen was murdered in April 2020, with her suspected killer, servicemember, Spc. Aaron Robinson, shooting and killing himself when pursued by police.
Her death launched a sweeping probe into sexual assault and violence at the base. The investigations led to 14 leaders being relieved or suspended from their positions and several policy changes.
