José had been walking in the desert for five days.
Then he fell and tore a ligament in his leg. While he was sleeping, his guide and the rest of his group left him behind and continued their journey from Mexico to the United States. With no water and only a small bag of cereal for food, José needed the food, water and medical attention that the No Mas Muertes volunteers provided when they found him.
Jessica Burger, Overland Park senior, was one of the volunteers in the group that found José.
"He just wanted to go home," Burger said.
Burger said when José told the group he did not want to continue his journey, they called an ambulance for him so he could receive treatment for his leg before being sent back to Mexico. But instead of an ambulance, the border patrol came.
Burger and other students from the University have volunteered with No Mas Muertes (No More Deaths), a humanitarian aid organization based in Tucson, Ariz., during spring and winter breaks through the alternative break program.
Data source: U.S. Department of Homeland Security
Ben Berning, Shawnee senior and co-director of Alternative Breaks, said every year students involved in the alternative breaks program explore options for volunteer sites that might be interesting to students at the University.
"We always try to add at least two new sites per semester in order to keep interest in our program high," Berning said. "This year No Mas Muertes was one of our new sites and was instantly one of our more popular ones."
Burger and another student who volunteered over spring break decided to return to Arizona this summer as volunteers. Brenna Daldorph, Lawrence senior, is co-site leader with Burger for the summer alternative break program. Ten students from the University will be volunteering with No Mas Muertes from Aug. 6 to Aug. 16.
Hundreds of people die each year while trying to cross the U.S.-Mexico border through the Sonora Desert. According to an April 1 press release from the Coalición de Derechos Humanos (Human Rights Coalition), 50 people have died in the desert since October 2008.
Erika Sandoval, Solomon graduate student, researches Latin American immigration. She said during former President George W. Bush's administration, the Department of Homeland Security increased surveillance on parts of the border where people found it easiest to cross.
"Homeland Security doesn't think people will cross the desert, so they don't have surveillance there," Sandoval said. "But people want to cross, so they'll look for other places to go. The stricter the enforcements are, the more deaths there are along the border."
Watch the interview with Erika Sandoval.
Daldorph said while she was volunteering with No Mas Muertes over spring break, it was the busiest week for desert crossings that No Mas Muertes had ever seen.
"It's life-changing to meet someone who's in a situation where they're trying to cross the desert," Daldorph said. "You realize that government policy has forced them into a life-threatening situation."
Sandoval said crossing the desert is risky, but it is difficult for people in Mexico and countries such as Guatemala and Nicaragua to obtain visas. Some, especially indigenous people from central Mexican states, cannot afford them. Sandoval said most migrants use family networks to obtain money for false documents or a coyote (human smuggler) to guide them through the desert. If they have family or friends who are already in the U.S., they ask them for money to pay for the trip.
"If you want to get across, you're going to keep trying--three, four, however many times it takes--especially if it [the border] is splitting you between your children or husband or wife," Sandoval said.
Chelsea Brown, Olathe sophomore, participated in the program with No Mas Muertes in December 2008.
"Being in a No Mas Muertes camp means being able to look out of your tent in the morning and see the beautiful Sonoran desert, but knowing that somewhere in that same desert someone might be dying," Brown said. "It's haunting."
Brown and Burger said it was rewarding to see water jugs that they had placed in the desert had been emptied. For the volunteers, it meant that migrants struggling through the desert had a better chance of survival. Daldorph said the volunteers kept records of how much of the water was gone from each part of the migrant trail that the jugs were placed on so they could keep track of which areas were more frequented.
Data source: Coalicion de Derechos Humanos
Brown said the saddest part of her volunteer experience was seeing all the things that the migrants had to leave behind them on the trail through the desert. She said the volunteers found clothes, backpacks, and Red Bull cans.
"We even saw a packing list for the trip written on the back of someone's math homework," Brown said.
Daldorph said one of the goals for the volunteers from the University is to raise awareness about the situation at the border. She said many people don't realize that the government's immigration policy affects everyone.
"People don't realize that this is happening in our country," Daldorph said. "We have a commitment to talk about these issues when we come back."
