WEBB COUNTY, Tex. (KGNS) - After nearly a decade, the trial of the man accused of abusing a child is underway.

Ricardo Jimenez is on trial accused of sexually abusing a child under the age of 14. The case was reported back in 2014. Jimenez is also accused of injury to a child and terroristic threat to a family member.

Tuesday, June 13 is the second day of the trial where the victim is said to take the stand.

The trial continues in the 341st District Court.

EAGLE PASS, Texas (Border Report) — With stricter asylum rules in place at the southern border, more migrants crossing into the border town of Eagle Pass are trying to evade and run from law enforcement, Border Report has learned.

During a ride along with deputies from the Maverick County Sheriff’s Office this week, Border Report did not see the usual asylum-seeking families or individuals turning themselves in after crossing the river, but did witness a chase, and saw debris like empty water bottles, shoes and backpacks and other evidence that people are crossing in the brush and trying not to get caught.

“At the (Border Patrol) processing center they said they’ve been slow, they’ve been really slow. So I guess they’re not apprehending as much because they’re running more rather than wanting to get processed,” Maverick County Sheriff’s Sgt. Fernando Ibarra told Border Report.

Across the Southwest border, migrant encounters are down 70% since Title 42 was lifted in May and was replaced by Title 8 rules, Department of Homeland Security officials say.

Under Title 8, asylum-seekers must apply for interviews with U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials via the CBP One app. If they enter illegally in between ports of entry they’re sent back and can’t try to return for several years, according to DHS.

Just a few months ago, dozens of families could be seen at any time of the day, or night, staging on the other side of the border, in Piedras Negras, Mexico, then they would cross in rafts and flotation devices and turn themselves into National Guard troops waiting on the Texas side.

Now, National Guard troops have relocated their command center to another area; the old one is empty, and where dozens of buses were brought in to take migrants for processing is now only dusty trails with the sounds of birds flying overhead.

A few small islands located off-shore in the middle of the Rio Grande have become areas to where many swim and hide and catch their breath, Maverick County Sheriff’s Deputy Jesus Sanchez said.

“What these illegal immigrants do is they go ahead and cross the border, catch a break at the island, either to get some water or catch their breath, they step on the rocks and pretty much just cross,” Sanchez said.

He took Border Report on a five-hour ride along Monday through bumpy and sandy terrain in triple-digit heat.

While patrolling the southernmost highway alongside the border wall, his eagle eyesight spotted a man walking shirtless under the tree line on the north side of the road.

Sanchez made an abrupt U-turn and the man immediately began to run.

Sanchez drove his black pickup through groves of thick mesquite trees, nearly hitting his unit and swerving to avoid tree trunks.

“Parar! Parar! (stop, stop)” he yelled in Spanish.

And the man knelt on the ground and put his head down and hands behind his back.

The entire chase took less than a minute.

And after he was handcuffed and told to put on a shirt, he admitted that he had come through a nearby drainage tunnel that goes under the highway and opens near the river.

The 18-year-old man said he was from Honduras and was coming to work. But he gave different names and had two ID’s with different names. When Sanchez asked his name, he stumbled and mixed them up.

He was wet and muddy, and after he was put in the back of the pickup, Sanchez went to the drainage tunnel to look for other migrants.

Spiderwebs covered the entrance to the concrete tunnel and water bottles with Mexican labels lay littered on the ground.

“It connects under the highway and leads to the other side of the brush area, and maybe 100 or 200 yards, that’s where the river is. So they make it all the way over here,” Sanchez said.

Walking back to the truck, he searched the ground for footprints, and he listened to crackling branches, which he says are telltale signs of others near.

He believed they weren’t alone but didn’t find anyone else.

Eventually, he drove the man to the Border Patrol station where agents would process and further investigate him.

“He said it’s his first time,” Sanchez said. “But they’ll go ahead and implement him into the system. If it is his first time, they’ll talk to him and tell him what’s going to happen and if he gets caught again or it’s his second or third time he’ll get consequences.”

If he is sent back to Mexico, he has to wait five years to try to re-enter. If he has tried to cross illegally before then he could be barred for 20 years.

LAREDO, Texas (Border Report) — Ever since migrants were required to make asylum interviews on the CBP One app, the head of Catholic Charities of Laredo says she has heard horrifying tales of migrants robbed, kidnapped and held for ransom across the border in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico.

The violence against migrants in Nuevo Laredo reached such high levels that U.S. Customs and Border Protection recently announced it is no longer scheduling asylum interviews in Laredo, Texas.

“Many of them are kidnapped and they have to wait until their family members pay the money before they’re released, or they take everything from them at that point and they’re made to cross the bridge, cross the river illegally, without any information. Their phones are taken, and their money is taken. So at that point, they have no resources or point of contacts. So those are those are the stories that we hear,” said Rebecca Solloa, executive director of Catholic Charities of Laredo.

“CBP temporarily reallocated Laredo Port of Entry CBP One appointments to other ports of entries based on an assessment of the security situation in Nuevo Laredo and other operational factors including relatively low demand for appointments for that location,” a CBP official told Border Report on Tuesday.

Appointments that were scheduled before June 3 are still being honored at Laredo’s Bridge I, the city’s only pedestrian crossing, but no new appointments are being scheduled, the agency said.

That means the 1,250 appointments available daily on the CBP One app must be scheduled at certain Southwest ports of entry from San Diego to Brownsville, Texas.

CBP requires asylum-seekers to apply for interviews at U.S. ports of entry as part of new rules that incentivize individuals who use legal pathways to enter the U.S., which have been enforced since Title 42 border restrictions were lifted on May 11. That has decreased by 70% the number of migrants U.S. border agents have encountered crossing the border in between legal U.S. ports of entry but has increased the number of asylum-seekers waiting in dangerous Mexican towns south of the Rio Grande.

Rebecca Solloa is the executive director of Catholic Charities of Laredo, Texas. (Sandra Sanchez/Border Report)

Solloa says the agency made the right decision because in-fighting among rival cartels and other violence against asylum-seekers in that Mexican city increases daily.

“We hear all the stories that do happen as they’re coming to the bridge to cross to plead their asylum case, to present themselves with their appointments. And many, many obstacles come their way and they become victims, either kidnapping or extortion before they get to the bridge to present themselves,” Solloa said.

“These stories that migrants have told us come up and we share that with our border, our federal partners, by letting them know this is what’s happening,” she said. “I’m glad they listen for the safety of everybody.”

LAREDO, Texas (Border Report) – The federal government is giving out nearly $300 million in new FEMA funds to nonprofit organizations that help to feed and shelter asylum-seeking migrants.

The Department of Homeland Security announced Monday that the first tranche of $290 million would be given in Fiscal Year 2023 to 34 non-governmental organizations that offer temporary shelter and other assistance for migrants who have been processed and provisionally released from DHS custody in the United States.

As part of the FY23 Shelter and Services Program, Catholic Charities of Laredo has been awarded $6.4 million, and the Laredo Fire Department will receive close to $6 million, U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar, a Democrat from Laredo who sits on the House Appropriations Committee, announced.

“It is critical that we bring law and order to our southern border. I have been working in constant coordination with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and our local entities here in Laredo to tackle the challenges that continue to arise in our border communities,” Cuellar said, adding that the grant funds “will reimburse Catholic Charities of Laredo and the Laredo Fire Department for their important work in alleviating pressure at our processing facilities.”

Catholic Charities of Laredo, part of the Diocese of Laredo, has three migrant shelters that help up to 500 people and have overnight facilities for 250 asylum-seekers, Rebecca Solloa, executive director of the nonprofit, told Border Report on Tuesday.

She said the additional federal funds are a God-send.

“This money helps us breathe. This money helps the programs to stay stable and available for all the migrants who are coming through our community,” Solloa said from her administrative offices in a quiet neighborhood in downtown Laredo.

Before Title 42 was lifted on May 11, thousands of asylum-seeking migrants were bused from Brownsville and other areas of the Rio Grande Valley and El Paso to Laredo to be processed.

Laredo has a soft-sided processing facility on the far southeast side of the city that became the destination location for many.

Those who were released often found themselves in Laredo with few resources and turned to organizations like Catholic Charities for help.

Solloa said her facilities were at capacity on a daily basis. Now they receive about 150 migrants per day who are released by DHS.

“The Laredo area processing center is considered a decompression zone so it decompresses other areas in other sections that are saturated, such as from Eagle Pass, Del Rio, El Paso. We’ve seen people from California, from Arizona, and from the RGV area. We’re still seeing maybe 150 per day which is still a very doable number compared to before Title 42 expired so we’re still kept busy because the other ports of entry are still busy,” she said.

A total of $363.8 million in FEMA funds have been earmarked and approved by Congress for distribution this fiscal year. DHS says an additional $73 million in allotments will be available later this summer.

McALLEN, Texas (Border Report) — The former assistant sheriff who suddenly retired this week after he became the focus of an FBI investigation, has now been asked to step down as a board trustee for the largest school district in Laredo, Texas.

Board trustees for United Independent School District on Thursday evening unanimously adopted a “no-confidence” vote and resolution against trustee Ricardo “Rick” Rodriguez, and asked for him to resign, United ISD School Board President Ramiro Veliz III, told Border Report on Friday.

Veliz said the board did not have the authority to force his resignation, since he is an elected official. But he said they did put restrictions on the funds he has available and where he can go.

“We asked for his resignation; we did the no-confidence vote, we prohibited him from attending district events, being on district property. He’s still a sitting board member — and if he doesn’t resign, he has the ability to attend official meetings and workshops that we have, and exercise his authority as a board member. But it’s limited just to those functions. We also prohibited future travel for conferences, and also limiting the use of his discretionary funds for the upcoming school year,” Veliz told Border Report.

He said that after the FBI raided the Webb County Sheriff’s Office on Monday and Sheriff Martin Cuellar publicly named Rodriguez as the “focus” of the federal agency’s probe that other board trustees worried about his ability to perform his elected duties.

Cuellar says Rodriguez’s coronavirus sterilizing company that he operated during the pandemic is in question.

Rodriguez also last month turned himself into Laredo Police after allegations that he assaulted an emergency room doctor, according to media reports. A warrant was issued for Rodriguez’s arrest.

“This is the second incident that involved Mr. Rodriguez in a short period of time so they felt that his ability to continue as a board member is questioned,” Veliz said.

Veliz said the FBI did visit the administration offices for United ISD and requested information which he said “was already handed over but other than that, there has been no other subsequent visit or any interviews or anything to that effect with any employees or any other board members.”

United ISD has over 41,000 students and is the largest of three school districts in the border area of Laredo, Texas.