Mission apartment used to stash immigrants (KGBT-AZ)

Mission apartment used to stash immigrants
Three smugglers arrested, 14 Central American immigrants in custody

Friday, February 19, 2010 at 11:38 a.m.

Three people are behind bars after Border Patrol agents found 14 Central American immigrants crammed into a bedroom of a squalid apartment in Mission.

U.S. Border Patrol agents arrested Raquel Mata-Hernandez, Edgar Ivan Hernandez-Valdez and Milton Bladimir Sola-Flores on immigrant smuggling charges Tuesday.

The three are accused of using an apartment at 6213 Charro Street as a stash house for illegal immigrants.

Court records show that a Border Patrol agents received a tip that the apartment was being used for illegal activity.

Authorities performed a stake out and saw 15 people getting out of a Ford Taurus around 12:30 p.m. Tuesday.

Investigators later followed Hernandez-Valdez and Sola-Flores to a gas station off La Homa Road and 5 Mile Line.

Mata-Hernandez allegedly gave investigators consent to search the apartment.

Court records show that the two-bedroom apartment was messy and unclean. The 14 immigrants from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador were all crammed into one bedroom.

Mata-Hernandez said she and her husband had been renting the apartment for a year and that got paid $20 dollars per immigrant.

Court records show that Hernandez-Valdez and Sola-Flores were caretakers while Mata-Hernandez was a leader. Her husband was not identified in the court records.

Mata-Hernandez, Hernandez-Valdez and Sola-Flores appeared before U.S. Magistrate Court Judge Peter Ormsby in McAllen on Thursday morning.

Court records show that Mata-Hernandez and Hernandez-Valdez are from Mexico while Sola-Flores is from El Salvador. All three of them are illegal immigrants.

Judge Ormsby denied bond for them until a Tuesday afternoon hearing.