Teens often behind the wheel in high-speed chases with Texas DPS

El Paso teens and young adults are often involved in high-speed pursuits by Texas DPS troopers seeking smugglers of undocumented migrants.

By Aaron J. Montes, KTEPDecember 10, 2024 10:15 am,

From KTEP:

EL PASO, Texas (KTEP) – Just after daybreak, a Texas state trooper on patrol radioed an alert, he was chasing a suspected migrant smuggler in east El Paso.

The black and white Texas Department of Public Safety, or DPS vehicle, pursued a red Chevrolet Equinox as a light rain fell on a summer day. Milton Gonzalez, 19, was behind the wheel. He stopped at a busy intersection.

“Let me see your hands!” the trooper shouted twice as he got out of his vehicle. The scene was captured by the trooper’s dash camera video obtained by KTEP News through a Texas Public Information Act request.

Watch full video and other pursuit videos here.

The video then shows the Equinox speeding away from the trooper. Gonzalez led the trooper on a chase, sometimes reaching speeds over 100 miles per hour for at least 40 minutes. They zig zagged through narrow streets in El Paso’s Lower Valley. Gonzalez drove the wrong way on a residential road, and weaved between traffic on the border highway nearly hitting other cars.

High speed pursuits are particularly prevalent in border communities and involve teens and young adults, often U.S. citizens, part of a strategy by smugglers to skirt the law. The chases also pose a danger for residents.

Collisions have resulted in injuries and deaths of people in the vehicles but also bystanders.

From January 1 to September 22 of this year, DPS troopers initiated 258 chases, according to an analysis by KTEP News. That’s compared to 296 chases during the same time period last year. While the total declined, the number of chases ending in a crash rose slightly compared to the same timeframe in 2023.

According to DPS policy, individual troopers decide when or whether to pursue a driver suspected of transporting undocumented immigrants.

Gonzalez’s pursuit ended in a crash on the border highway when the trooper performed what’s known as a PIT maneuver, hitting the back of the vehicle causing it to flip and roll twice. In the video, one of the passengers flies out of a window and the Equinox appears to roll on top of his legs.

“I don’t know what I was thinking,” Gonzalez told KTEP News during an exclusive interview at the Rogelio Sanchez State Jail in East El Paso County where he’s serving a five year sentence after pleading guilty to several charges. They included smuggling with the likelihood of serious bodily injury or death.

Aaron Montes / KTEP News

Milton Gonzalez, 22, is serving five year sentence at Rogelio Sanchez State Jail in East El Paso County after pleading guilty to several charges including smuggling with likelihood of serious bodily injury or death.

KTEP News’ analysis of cases found teenagers and young adults are often the drivers involved in high-speed pursuits by state troopers going after suspected smugglers transporting unauthorized migrants. The strategy is part of Gov. Greg Abbott’s Operation Lone Star border enforcement initiative.

Kelli Childress, El Paso County’s Chief Public Defender, said her office represented about 300 individuals charged with human smuggling this year. She said many drivers are teens or young adults.

“And, you look at that person in the face and they’ve never been arrested before and you have to tell them ‘by the way, if you’re convicted, you’re going to prison for a minimum of 10 years,” Childress said. “If we want to address the problem of giving people rides who may be migrants, and the state of Texas really wants to put resources in addressing that, then start educating people.”

Smuggling organizations pay between $300 to $1000 dollars per migrant depending on the length of the trip, according to Oscar F. Hagelseib, a 25 year veteran of federal law enforcement and president of Hagelsieb Strategic Investigation, HSI.

“Smugglers resort to recruiting teens and young adults because they are more susceptible to being influenced by easy money,” added Hagelsieb.

Social media was a recruiting tool but these days it’s done more by “word of mouth” after federal authorities used undercover social media profiles to identify the recruiters, Hagelseib said.

“That’s not to say that social media doesn’t play a major role in the recruitment, though. Smugglers and recruiters demonstrate on social media, flashy cars and jewelry and a lifestyle that many impoverished teens dream about,” he said.

Some teens pursued by DPS have been involved in fatal crashes like 17-year-old Joseph Anthony Maldonado. He is charged with murder and scheduled for arraignment today.

Maldonado blew through a red light in a Dodge Charger, allegedly with six migrants inside on October 4. He struck a blue Toyota Corolla, nearly ripping the roof off the compact car, killing Wendy Rodriguez, 42, on her way to work.

In another case Adrian Neeko Brustie, 19 and Juelissa Ceniceros 20, were charged with two murders after they were involved in a collision that killed two migrants on November 20, 2023.

Brustie allegedly drove through a shopping center’s parking lot while migrants jumped out of the moving vehicle in the Northwest edge of El Paso County. Brustie allegedly led a high-speed chase reaching speeds up to 100-miles-per-hour ending nearly 18 miles away in the Lower Valley.

According to court documents, Brustie struck a curb and hit a yield sign causing him to lose control of his vehicle and rolled over.

Most of the pursuits and crashes happen in Northwest El Paso near the Texas-New Mexico state line, a precinct represented by El Paso County Commissioner Sergio Coronado.

He said said state troopers should dedicate resources and technology to tracking drivers to their destination instead of engaging in high-speed chases, adding, “it might lead them to where the actual stash houses are or where other individuals are involved.”

Gonzalez, now 22, claims he did not know the people in the car he was driving were undocumented, though he pleaded guilty to smuggling charges. He says he was recruited on social media to give people a ride and was offered hundreds of dollars per passenger. He declined to give an exact amount.

From behind bars he cautions other young people looking to make quick money, “think twice. Do work that is legal.”

KTEP News Director Angela Kocherga contributed to this story.

This map is a representation of available data provided by the Texas Department of Public Safety through a Texas Public Information Act request. The color-coded icons represent pursuits by DPS troopers after suspected undocumented migrant smugglers recorded by the agency between June 22, 2023 to September 22, 2024. Blue icons generally represent pursuits, green means the state trooper aborted their pursuit and orange reflects a pursuit that ended in a collision. Icons reflected on the map include data that had accompanying longitude and latitude coordinates. According to the data provided by DPS, Between January 1, 2024 to September 22, 2024, 257 chases were recorded. And, between June 22, 2023 to December 29, 2023, 257 chases were recorded.

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