Foes Call INS Checkpoint Hazardous, Urge Move

San Clemente city officials, tired of seeing U.S. Border Patrol chases end in bloody accidents on their streets, are renewing their call for Congress to finance a long-proposed relocation of the immigration checkpoint that is just four miles south of the city limits.

“It’s like a time bomb,” San Clemente Mayor Brian J. Rice said. “One day the chases will result in some innocent adults or children being killed on the streets of our city.”

Last month, 10 people were injured after they jumped from a van that Border Patrol agents were chasing on Interstate 5 in San Clemente. The chase began when the van’s driver sped off while he was being questioned at the checkpoint.

16-Lane Checkpoint Proposed

The federal Immigration and Naturalization Service, which runs the checkpoint near the San Onofre nuclear power plant, proposed three years ago that it be moved 5 miles south, into San Diego County. The new checkpoint would be expanded into 16 lanes (the existing checkpoint has four lanes), both to facilitate traffic on northbound Interstate 5 and to reduce opportunities for illegal immigrants to evade arrest.

The proposal has the backing of Sen. Pete Wilson (R-San Diego) and Rep. Ron Packard (R-Carlsbad). The Defense Department, which owns the Camp Pendleton Marine Corps base, the site of both the present and proposed checkpoints, also approves of the change, according to Packard’s office.

But action has lagged in Congress, mainly because of the $30-million cost of the project, Packard said last week.

“It’s hard to get money authorized because of the tight budget situations,” Packard said. But the cost is justified, he said, because the new checkpoint might save lives as well as aid the government’s efforts to stop illegal immigration and drug smuggling.

Up to 10 Deaths Last Year

Charles Geer, patrol agent in charge of the checkpoint, said that he had no exact statistics on fatal accidents at the site but that “about eight to 10” people have been killed there in the last year.

San Clemente Fire Department paramedics, who respond to such accidents, said the victims usually are illegal immigrants who jump from vehicles stopped at the checkpoint and are struck as they dart into southbound traffic on the San Diego Freeway.

In addition, Geer said, some motorists fail to slow down in time at the existing checkpoint and slam into the line of stopped vehicles.

“There would be a minimum traffic backup,” Geer said, referring to the multilane design of the proposed new checkpoint. And the chances for high-speed chases running into San Clemente would be reduced at the new location, he said.

“I think a new checkpoint would help our situation,” San Clemente Police Chief Al Ehlow said. “The configuration makes it more difficult for a high-speed chase to begin. Then, too, if a chase were to start, the new checkpoint would be five miles farther south from San Clemente, giving them more time to head off the suspects before they got to our city. We’ve had problems with those chases for many years.”

Packard said he has pushed the safety angle in trying to drum up congressional support for a new checkpoint. At one time, he said, the relocation proposal seemed to have broad support in Congress.

“But now it seems to be in limbo,” Packard said.

Last year, Packard and Wilson succeeded in getting $2.7 million earmarked for engineering and design studies. But at the last minute, a congressional conference committee deleted the designation, and money was spent elsewhere.

‘Back to Square Zero’

“Now we’re back to square zero,” Packard said. “Sen. Wilson and I are now hoping we can get the funding for the checkpoint inserted into one of the anti-drug bills. If not, I’ll try to get the funding into a highway appropriation bill.”

The checkpoint near San Clemente is the busiest in the nation, according to the INS. In 1988, agents there captured 54,678 deportable illegal immigrants and arrested another 800 who were involved in smuggling operations, according to Packard’s office.

The checkpoint also recovered stolen property--including cars and items burglarized from homes--valued at more than $2 million last year. A total of 128 narcotics seizures were made.