RURAL TOWNS ACROSS THE BORDER IN CHIHUAHUA BLOODIED BY CARTEL VIOLENCE

FORT HANCOCK -- People seem serene working the cotton and alfalfa
fields in the rural community 50 miles southeast of El Paso.

Fort Hancock is a stark contrast to the rural towns across the border
in Chihuahua, where residents are victims of brutal daylight attacks
at their homes and shops and on their roads.

One of every four killings in and near Juarez has taken place in small
rural communities that share a border with Texas towns like Fort
Hancock. Because of fear, Mexican residents are fleeing these towns
and seeking asylum in the United States through Fort Hancock's
international bridge.

These border agricultural towns in Chihuahua are better known as the
Valley of Juarez, an area the U.S. State Department has said should be
avoided. The violence-plagued towns are also adjacent to Tornillo,
Fabens and San Elizario.

On Thursday, two men were killed in the border town of Praxedis
Guerrero, close to Tornillo. One was shot more than 40 times at a
cell-phone shop.

The U.S. Border Patrol said these are "hot corridors" for drug and
human smuggling. Both the Sinaloa and Juarez drug cartels are fighting
to control these passages.

In December, a top member of the Juarez cartel, Jose Rodolfo "El
Rikin" Escajeda Escajeda, was arrested in Nuevo Casas Grandes,
Chihuahua, by the Mexican army. Escajeda was known for terrorizing the
population to control the corridors in the Valley of Juarez.

Earlier this year, the Mexican army arrested 10 members, mostly
teenagers, of a cell that worked for the Sinaloa cartel's Joaquin "El
Chapo" Guzman in the agricultural valley. They kidnapped and killed
people for about $40 a week, Chihuahua state officials said.

No more than 18,000 people live in these communities east of Juarez.
The area has seen 45 murders in March. About 180 people have been
killed in Juarez this month.

U.S. law enforcement agencies have noticed an increase in asylum
seekers crossing through the Fort Hancock international bridge.

Customs and Border Protection officials did not have data on people
seeking asylum, but spokesman Roger Maier said more Mexican residents
are fleeing through Fort Hancock. The agency is in charge of those
requests.

"It has been busier than normal during March for asylum claims," Maier
said.

When people claim asylum in the area, they are placed in detention
centers in El Paso while they await interviews with U.S. Citizenship
and Immigration Services. The cases are then turned over to an
immigration judge.

Hudspeth County Sheriff Arvin West said the increase in arrivals
started a couple of weeks ago.

Sheriff's deputies conducted interviews on Saturday with residents
crossing through the international bridge from El Porvenir in
Chihuahua to Fort Hancock. They wanted to find out why more and more
people were crossing to Fort Hancock.

West said criminal organizations in Mexico posted notices about two
weeks ago that residents in El Porvenir had 30 days to vacate the
community. If they didn't, they and their families would be kidnapped
or killed, West said residents told him.

"It's a bleak situation," he said. "People are afraid over there.
People are scared over there."

West has deployed every available man to the Fort Hancock area to be
prepared for a possible spillover of violence.

"If they start trying to kidnap people in Fort Hancock, we want to be
ready," he said.

The sheriff's office is working with the Texas Department of Public
Safety to beef up security. The Border Patrol also has a heavy
presence in the area, and its vehicles are all over the towns on Texas
Highway 20.

Residents said they have noticed more patrolling.

Esmeralda Hernandez, who works in a pizza place in Fort Hancock, has
noticed changes. "In the last two weeks, there has been a lot of
police in the area, state troopers, sheriff's deputies," she said.

Other residents have seen an extreme change in surveillance on Highway
20. Marta, who did not want to use her full name because she feared
retaliation against her family in El Porvenir, said people in Fort
Hancock are fully aware of the violence across the border.

"There is panic, not fear," she said. "The situation is dreadful; the
towns in Chihuahua are being abandoned."

Hernandez said she fears the newcomers she has begun to notice around
town.

"We see people we don't know," she said. "We don't know if they are
trustworthy."

U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, has expressed concerns over the rising
violence along the southern border. Last week, he wrote to Senate
Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy to request an immediate
committee hearing on the subject.

The district of U.S. Rep. Ciro Rodriguez, D-Texas, includes Fort
Hancock, which is near the line that divides Hudspeth and El Paso counties.

"What's happening in El Porvenir is tragic and unacceptable. Nobody
should have to flee their homes because of senseless, drug-related
violence," Rodriguez said. "This dire situation is one more reason why
we must continue funding border law enforcement efforts."