County Attorney: Cartels Continue To Recruit Teens In El Paso
by ABC-7 Reporter Martin Bartlett
EL PASO — It’s a problem that’s as old as the border: El Paso kids getting into trouble in Jurez.
But the arrest of a 16-year-old related to a cartel hit underscores that the trouble they’re getting into is getting more serious.
And the problem is coming to them right here in El Paso.
“I just didn’t care. I had like, no, I guess you could say, I had no conscience,” former El Paso teen drug smuggler Danny Santos told CNN earlier this year.
He was lured into the drug underworld at just 15.
El Paso County Attorney Jos Rodriguez said that’s when it starts for too many El Paso teens. Cartels have crossed the border, he says, recruiting teens in El Paso schools by making a long list of promises.
“High on the list is the attraction of easy money,” Rodriguez said.
Santos told CNN he made about $50,000 bringing loads across for the cartel. Rodriguez says for many teens the cost of getting involved isn’t measured in dollars or pesos.
“(The cartels) will harm them,” Rodriguez said. “Once you get sucked into it, you’re gonna have a tough time getting out of it.”
The cartels often promote those teens, who Rodriguez called “expendable,” into increasingly deadly positions of power.
“You know you go through the whole thing, say ‘I’m an American citizen,’ you just have to forget that you have something illegal in the car,” Santos said.
