Hello, I’m Saul. I am fleeing from Honduras, and I’ve been in Nogales for a year and four months. This all started when a relative of mine was asked to join a gang, and they left him in a wheelchair because they shot him. My brother didn’t take them to court, but I wanted to. Someone told them that I was wanting to threaten the gang.
I was threatened by a group of people from the gang, and they said I had to leave, and if I didn’t, they’d come for me that same afternoon. I traveled for two days from Honduras to get to Mexico and took two more days to reach the train.
Criminals assault everyone on the train. They took everything from us, what little we had. Then the police stole from us. I couldn’t get permission to cross the Mexican border because the same gang controls that part of the border.
That’s how we came; at each train stop, the police stopped us, took money from us. I traveled by train about four or five days and arrived in Nogales. A week after I arrived here, I was with a group of migrants waiting for a truck to go to Kino, and a car arrived and the people threatened us, saying we couldn’t be there. I felt fear in that moment, as if the world was slipping away, as if I was going to be killed right then and there. There’s nothing you can do in that situation. You can’t file a complaint; you can’t do anything because you’re a migrant.
A few weeks ago, I was threatened again. A group of four people showed up. One of them drew a gun, asked for my cell phone, looked through my contacts, and recorded them on his phone, and returned it to me. I was afraid to think that they could have taken me into the car, they could have disappeared me, and nobody would have known it. He said they didn’t want unknown people there.
Even at work they ask if I have someone who can pay for me on the other side. I just respond that I’m waiting for asylum. I’ve been in Nogales for a year and four months now. This time has been a nightmare. When I arrived, I thought I’d be here four, five months. But the same wait list kept us out because other people passed before us. There was a lot of corruption in the way that list was handled. With the pandemic, everything was closed.
A lot of people might not realize that we’re suspended in an underworld and that we can’t move in any direction. I come here fleeing crime, and the same thing’s waiting for me here. It’s like I’m having a nightmare and I can’t wake up from it. They say that here, they’ll kidnap you from your home and no one will say anything because the government is working for the same people that take you. Mexican officials told me that whatever happens, they wouldn’t say a thing, because they all work together.
Now, President Biden is saying that Central American people shouldn’t come. What he doesn’t understand is that crime continues. Sending people back means returning them directly into the hands of the people who are going to kill them. The United States is a respected country. They need to take the leadership to end corruption and demand change. As a powerful country, the U.S. also has the responsibility to set an example – to lend a hand to people fleeing from violence.
I was threatened by a group of people from the gang, and they said I had to leave, and if I didn’t, they’d come for me that same afternoon. I traveled for two days from Honduras to get to Mexico and took two more days to reach the train.
Criminals assault everyone on the train. They took everything from us, what little we had. Then the police stole from us. I couldn’t get permission to cross the Mexican border because the same gang controls that part of the border.
That’s how we came; at each train stop, the police stopped us, took money from us. I traveled by train about four or five days and arrived in Nogales. A week after I arrived here, I was with a group of migrants waiting for a truck to go to Kino, and a car arrived and the people threatened us, saying we couldn’t be there. I felt fear in that moment, as if the world was slipping away, as if I was going to be killed right then and there. There’s nothing you can do in that situation. You can’t file a complaint; you can’t do anything because you’re a migrant.
A few weeks ago, I was threatened again. A group of four people showed up. One of them drew a gun, asked for my cell phone, looked through my contacts, and recorded them on his phone, and returned it to me. I was afraid to think that they could have taken me into the car, they could have disappeared me, and nobody would have known it. He said they didn’t want unknown people there.
Even at work they ask if I have someone who can pay for me on the other side. I just respond that I’m waiting for asylum. I’ve been in Nogales for a year and four months now. This time has been a nightmare. When I arrived, I thought I’d be here four, five months. But the same wait list kept us out because other people passed before us. There was a lot of corruption in the way that list was handled. With the pandemic, everything was closed.
A lot of people might not realize that we’re suspended in an underworld and that we can’t move in any direction. I come here fleeing crime, and the same thing’s waiting for me here. It’s like I’m having a nightmare and I can’t wake up from it. They say that here, they’ll kidnap you from your home and no one will say anything because the government is working for the same people that take you. Mexican officials told me that whatever happens, they wouldn’t say a thing, because they all work together.
Now, President Biden is saying that Central American people shouldn’t come. What he doesn’t understand is that crime continues. Sending people back means returning them directly into the hands of the people who are going to kill them. The United States is a respected country. They need to take the leadership to end corruption and demand change. As a powerful country, the U.S. also has the responsibility to set an example – to lend a hand to people fleeing from violence.