“It makes me think of terrorism.”
“Report alleges Iraqi smuggling ring works out of Chaparral,” by Erica Molina Johnson for the El Paso Times (thanks to Denis):
CHAPARRAL — Residents in the close-knit community of Chaparral were surprised to hear that undocumented Iraqi and other Middle Eastern immigrants may be part of a human smuggling ring based here.
“Out of so many places, why here?” Chaparral resident Fabiola Gardea asked. “This is near my house. It scares me a lot because I never thought they would be this close.”
She said it would be easy for human smugglers to do well in the community.
“There’s a lot of empty houses and land everywhere,” she said.
Gardea said the possibility that some undocumented immigrants might be from Iraq is unsettling.
“It makes me think of terrorism,” she said. “They’re so close. Anything can happen. It’s very scary.”
ABC News reported that the FBI was investigating the possibility that Iraqi and other Middle Eastern immigrants might have been entering the country illegally through a smuggling operation based in Chaparral for more than a year.