New Operation Lone Star Task Force Now Tracking and Apprehending Gotaways; Texas Launches Task Force with K9s, Drones to Stop Illegal Immigrant ‘gotaways’ Amid Spike in Numbers

New Operation Lone Star task force now tracking and apprehending gotaways:

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has launched a new Operation Lone Star task force to track and apprehend gotaways – the term used by Border Patrol agents and law enforcement who illegally enter the U.S. intentionally in between ports of entry to evade law enforcement. Many have criminal records and are single young men of military age, BP agents and law enforcement officers have told The Center Square.

While an OLS Task Force launched many months ago by Goliad County Sheriff Roy Boyd to pursue gotaways, cartel operatives and smugglers operating along Highway 59, this task force is led by the Texas Department of Public Safety in the Rio Grande Valley. They are also using K9s and drones to detect, track down, and apprehend what has become record numbers of gotaways entering the U.S. every month.

In November, overall, known and recorded gotaways entering the U.S. illegally through the southern border totaled more than 93,000 – meaning nearly 100,000 people entered the U.S. illegally from all over the world and law enforcement has no idea who they are or where they are.

OLS DPS officers have played a vital role since OLS was launched in March 2021 – acting as the calvary to support local law enforcement offices that don’t have the resources or staff to handle the volume of people coming through small communities near the border. In McMullen County, for example, slightly 100 miles north of the Texas-Mexico border, the number of people who came through in one month was seven times greater than its population.

In one recent action, the new DPS unit apprehended roughly 50 illegal foreign nationals hiding in the brush near La Joya and Mission, Texas. In another, working with Border Patrol agents, they apprehended 30 people hiding in the brush in Sullivan City, in Hidalgo County – all from Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador who’d entered illegally as gotaways. —>READ MORE HERE

Texas launches task force with K9s, drones to stop illegal immigrant ‘gotaways’ amid spike in numbers:

Facing a massive ongoing surge of illegal immigration at the U.S. border, Texas authorities have launched a new elite task force — including K9s and drones — in order to track down and apprehend the record number of illegal aliens slipping past Border Patrol and into the U.S.

Fox News embedded with the strike force, which is part of Operation Lone Star, and saw as the teams went into the brush and arrested group after group of single adult men actively seeking to evade Border Patrol.

The new unit is composed of troopers, drone operators and tracking K9s. The Texas Department of Public Safety told Fox that its purpose is to augment resources for U.S. Border Patrol “in detecting, tracking and apprehending illegal immigrants who evade and avoid capture from law enforcement.” It also gathers intelligence, disrupts human smuggling and identifies scouts.

“This is in part due to the unprecedented number of gotaways,” spokesperson Lt. Christopher Olivarez told Fox. “We will continue to deploy specialized teams and task forces in strategic areas to address threats against public safety and provide support to our federal partners.”

While the U.S. has been dealing with a historic number of migrant encounters at the southern border, it has also been tackling record numbers of “gotaways” — illegal immigrants who slip past overwhelmed agents.

There were more than 73,000 “gotaways” in November alone, meaning there are already over 137,000 for this fiscal year. In FY2022 there were nearly 600,000 gotaways. There were 389,155 gotaways at the border in FY2021. —>READ MORE HERE

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