American Coyote

When people cross the US-Mexico border hoping to immigrate, they encounter a smuggling network whose operators are often highly vulnerable themselves

- By Jula Love

Dennis Wilson spent most of his days in early 2017 at an Exxon station in Corpus Christi, Texas, panhandling so he could buy food and meth. He'd arrive in the morning, park his walker between the ice machine and the Redbox movie kiosk and hold out a striped plastic cup.

One day, after a few hours, Wilson took stock of what he'd collected: about $50. Not enough, but a start. He'd been staying with friends after months of sleeping wherever he could find a safe place on the streets: under a freeway overpass, on a bus station bench, in a tent pitched in gritty sand. Then 54, he'd grappled with unstable housing since losing his job as a kitchen supervisor at Denny's and succumbing to the addiction he'd battled from adolescence.

As Wilson was settling back in, two heavyset young men approached. One handed him $3; the other, $2. Then they presented him an intriguing offer: Would he help them transport farm equipment for $100 a day? Wilson was unimpressed. "I make that in a couple hours just sitting on my butt," he said.

The men countered with $500. Wilson held firm. Finally, they went to $1,000 a day, a sum Wilson couldn't refuse.

The men introduced themselves as brothers from the Rio Grande Valley. They informed Wilson he'd need to start work right away, moving equipment from a town near the Mexican border to a ranch in Kingsville, Texas, past the US Border Patrol checkpoint. Wilson called the friend he'd been staying with to let her know not to wait up. Then he gathered his walker, cane, jacket and cigarettes and tucked his 6-foot-1-inch frame into the back of the brothers' SUV.