14ymedio, Ángel Salinas, Mexico, 27 March 2024 — The Mexican authorities rescued 85 migrants, including 50 Cubans, after coyotes demanded $300 each to allow them to continue to the United States. They had been in a house located in Bahías La Ventosa, in the port of Salina Cruz (state of Oaxaca) for at least a week, and according to municipal policeman Felipe Santiago, “the coyotes threatened to hand them over to drug traffickers if they didn’t pay.”
It was thanks to a telephone complaint received by the municipal police that the house could be located. The Police requested the support of the Mexican Navy and the State Investigation Agency to free the kidnapped migrants. During the operation, Santiago reports, two women and a man were captured.
One of the victims said they paid 2,500 dollars per person for their transfer from Guatemala to the U.S. border
According to the official, the detainees are accused of the alleged crimes of “illegal deprivation of liberty, threats and extortion.” One of the victims told the officers that the group had paid 2,500 dollars per person for their transfer from Guatemala to the U.S. border.
The coyote they paid led the group to Bahías La Ventosa, where a man and two women detained the migrants and asked them for more money, in additio