"The desert is a cemetery."
Brut reporter Léo Hamelin - Brut. headed to the Southern border to follow a rescue mission for migrants attempting the deadly cross into the United States.
Brut reporter Léo Hamelin - Brut. headed to the Southern border to follow a rescue mission for migrants attempting the deadly cross into the United States.
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00:00Guys, there is someone around here who needs help. We bring water and food.
00:10Robert, Robert, do you copy me?
00:13Here, comrade Rommel found a bone of the leg.
00:21And it is very short.
00:22A younger person.
00:25Approximately 14 to 16 years old.
00:30We are going to walk around here to see if there is anything else.
00:39Comrades, please, if you want to support us here.
00:45For Brut, I'm taking you to the US-Mexico border in California
00:49on a search mission to try to find lost migrants attempting to cross into the United States.
00:54I'm here with a group of volunteers, the Armadillos.
00:57They get phone calls from family members whose loved ones have disappeared in the desert.
01:02And they embark on extreme search and rescue missions to try to find them.
01:06I'm Angel Martinez. I'm from Oaxaca.
01:10I'm the president of this organization, Armadillos Busca y Rescate San Diego.
01:18In the desert, the heat is so extreme that the shoes come off in the heat.
01:26These are the water bottles that they carry in the desert.
01:31What is it called? A solar? So that they can charge their phones in the desert.
01:38A child's shoe.
01:41We don't know what happened to this child.
01:43If he managed to cross the desert or not.
01:46We don't know.
01:49A child's shoe.
01:51We don't know what happened to this child.
01:53If he managed to cross the desert or not.
01:58If someone finds this, I'm sure they'll eat it.
02:02Because it's life in the desert.
02:05In the desert, there's nothing to eat.
02:07There's no water, nothing.
02:10So, if I were one of them, I'd eat it.
02:15When I crossed the desert, I was 17 years old.
02:21The first two times we tried, the Bol Patrol caught us.
02:25We thanked the Immigration for finding us, because we would have died.
02:29The third time, we managed to cross.
02:32We also suffered a lot, because we got lost on the way.
02:37We suffered a lot.
02:39I know how the desert suffers.
02:42That's why I'm here, to help my people.
02:54Good morning.
02:55Salud, firmes y derechos.
03:00Here we go with all our companions.
03:02I think they're sleeping back there.
03:04There won't be any more signs in this place.
03:07So, there we are.
03:09Take care. God bless you.
03:12God bless you.
03:16We're all volunteers.
03:18We all have a family.
03:20We all have children.
03:23We all have a job.
03:25Some work in construction.
03:27Others work in gardening, in restaurants.
03:33But we have a mission, I think, in this life.
03:37Maybe on the streets, we're friends.
03:42But when we go into the desert, we're family.
03:48For me, an immigrant is my brother.
03:57Apparently, a stone has fallen on him, and they left him there.
04:00When did that happen?
04:02Last Sunday.
04:05That happened last Sunday.
04:07They left my uncle there.
04:09I don't know what I can do to get help.
04:12So, you have coordinates and everything, right?
04:15More or less, they sent us.
04:17Send me the information you have on WhatsApp, please.
04:22Where he stayed, how long he walked, where he went.
04:26That way, it'll be easier to locate him.
04:30Thank you very much.
04:32I'll send you all the information.
04:35Thank you very much.
04:37Goodbye.
04:50We walk where only immigrants walk.
04:56No cars, no motorcycles, no horses.
05:02There's a crisis at the border.
05:05Every day, people are dying.
05:13Robert, do you copy me?
05:15Go ahead, Diego.
05:17No, but there are bones.
05:19So, we're going to take the coordinates of the bones here
05:23and report them to the center.
05:25You may have seen Angel is carrying a cross, a white cross.
05:30That's just in the event that they would find a corpse.
05:34They are not allowed to touch a corpse or remains or anything.
05:39So, what they do is they put some red tape around it.
05:43They take photographs and then they notify local authorities.
05:59Yes.
06:29Yes, he also crossed the desert.
06:31Now, they are no longer there.
06:37And I feel that now, with more strength,
06:42I'm going forward doing this job.
06:59He's going to put it in his hands.
07:19The strongest thing about this job is to give news to the families
07:23who lost a loved one.
07:26They send us and tell us, you know what?
07:28My son, my daughter stayed in this place.
07:32They left her.
07:33And we got to the place, always hoping to find them alive.
07:38But in the end, many of them did not find us alive.
07:47We've been doing this for many years and we still haven't.
07:52We don't feel like it anymore because the need is here.
07:57Here, in these places.
08:01This desert is one of the deadliest migration corridors in the world.
08:05The temperatures can reach 140 degrees.
08:07There's no water, there's no shade.
08:09There are coyotes, snakes, corpios.
08:11But the construction of border walls and the influx of border patrol agents
08:16and surveillance technology such as drones
08:18has pushed people into more and more isolated parts of the desert,
08:22like these mountains.
08:48Do you leave it like this?
08:49Yes, I leave it like this.
08:55It has food for not many days.
08:58Maybe they got tired and left this abandoned here.
09:03Or maybe they were caught by migration.
09:06We don't know.
09:07But here it is very difficult for migration to enter.
09:11Here, only helicopters can enter.
09:13We don't have motorcycles.
09:15If you walk, you know how the road is.
09:32Lie down.
09:33Lie down so your legs get wet.
09:36Wet your legs.
09:39Wet your legs.
09:44Look, since you're better...
09:46Yes.
09:47You won't be able to get there.
09:49I swear, you won't be able to get there.
09:51Honestly, you won't be able to get there.
09:53We're talking about...
09:55About the heart.
09:56Two or three days that you won't be able to get there.
09:59The road is very long.
10:01We just got in in the morning.
10:03We ate a lot.
10:04The temperature is very high.
10:07You won't be able to get there.
10:09But it's fine with you, so we're going to do that, okay?
10:12Yes.
10:13And once you've recovered, it's something else.
10:15You can make it up.
10:16Yes, in time, my brother...
10:17They'll take you to Tijuana or something, and you'll recover and go again.
10:20Is that okay?
10:21Yes.
10:22Okay, Edwin, go ahead.
10:29The Armadillos can help migrants if they find them
10:32with water, food or first aid.
10:34But that's it.
10:35Giving them a ride, for instance,
10:37even if they're dying,
10:39would be committing a federal crime
10:41and they would potentially be considered as mugglers.
11:11Right now he's going to a hospital here in Phoenix.
11:16And he's on his way to life.
11:35He's gone, brother.
11:36Goodbye, brother.
11:41Goodbye.
12:12This one came out of Nanito Torero.
12:17I'm not going to fuck, because I'm going to fall.
12:32Don't do it to him, Ryder.
12:33Oh, fuck.
12:35He's going to get home.
12:37Oh, shit.
12:39And then, Romy, what happened to you?
12:41Well, because I was riding...
12:43The Lord Ryder.
12:45The Lord Ryder.
12:46The old shock absorber broke.
12:49I'm not going to stop looking for my migrant brothers
12:52until God tells me,
12:56you can't go on, Angel.
13:01It's very difficult.
13:03But I'm not going to stop.
13:09I'm going to keep looking for my people.
13:14As long as the walls are closed,
13:19they're not going to stop.
13:22And they're always going to need one,
13:24and we're going to be there for them.
13:28They are humans too.
13:32And they need an opportunity.
13:39AVAILABLE NOW