HARLINGEN, Texas (KVEO) — The Texas Department of Public Safety’s South Texas Special Operations Group helped U.S. Border Patrol agents rescue a 6-month old girl from the Rio Grande on March 16.
DPS Lt. Christopher Olivarez told KVEO that the mother and child had been waiting in Mexico since December to cross into the U.S.
The mother paid smugglers $3,500 to cross the Rio Grande into the U.S. The mom was assaulted by the smugglers in Mexico, which resulted in a broken leg, Olivarez said.
The mother and child crossed the river in rafts along with 67 adults and 150 children in Roma.
While crossing the river, the 6-month-old “female child who had been thrown out of a raft and into the Rio Grande River by smugglers,” the DPS group said in a Facebook post that included a picture of a trooper holding the young child.
The child was “safe” and is now with her mother in U.S. Border Patrol custody.
