Stories from other close to the tragedy
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Eddie Huffmaster, 61, Victoria
leming Prairie Road is a border of sorts.
Before bending north, the road stretches west for more than a mile, dividing 30 houses on one side from miles of ranch land on the other.
An 8-foot fence spans the length of the road – built behind the homes to keep deer out.
Eddie Huffmaster lives here. He awoke abruptly on May 14, 2003.
“Damn helicopters,” said Huffmaster, a retired welder. “DPS, SO, cops everywhere. What in the hell is all this about?”
Huffmaster smoked cigarettes at his dining room table and complained about his asthma. He wore a white T-shirt and patted his wild gray hair.
“That’s the price those boys pay if they want to come here and dance,” he said. “It’s a tragedy.”
Huffmaster has seen illegal immigrants for 30 years, although less often these days. They’d knock on his door to ask for food and water.
“They usually came late afternoon. Used to see one about once a month. Since Sheriff T. Michael O’Connor took over, you see a lot less. See a lot less dope, too.”
Despite his gruff talk, Huffmaster sympathizes with the illegal immigrants.
He and his wife, Dolores – “a do-good Christian who I just celebrated 40 years of marriage with” – have sheltered immigrants, he said.
“One walked from Laredo and he only drank from the Guadalupe. So, I drove him to New Orleans. He was in bad shape when I got him. Name was Fernando. Kept him home for four days,” he said.
Huffmaster’s home sits at the apex of a highway funnel that smugglers use to siphon humans, drugs and weapons from Mexico.
Behind his home, vast, rough, secluded countryside stretches to Refugio. From a gate, visitors can view a once oft-used path.
A 50-foot wide power line easement, which stretches south from his property, is bordered by 15-foot trees and dense desert brush.
The path looks like a road to Mexico – cleared but overrun by small brush and wavy grass.
An armadillo decomposed near the fence. And that’s where Huffmaster said he’s stood to watch immigrants creep out from the tree line at dusk to walk freely atop the navigable easement.
“You can’t blame them people for wanting to come over here,” he said.
Juan Martinez, 41, Victoria
uan Martinez faced two choices: Die in Mexico as a starving beggar and thief, or risk the trip north.
Like the 19 who died inside the tractor-trailer, smugglers stuffed Martinez into a tight space and shipped him toward Houston.
Only 13 years old at the time and fatherless, Martinez and three older friends crossed the Rio Grande River to reach Laredo.
There, smugglers stuffed the four Mexicans into a car trunk. The heat inside was unbearable.
“For the love of survival you had to put up with the heat,” he said.
Smugglers traveled back roads to avoid Border Patrol checkpoints, stretching the trip’s duration and leaving his side swollen and numb for days.
Once Martinez reached Houston, he began work. Now, he owns a Victoria mechanics business. Martinez received his citizenship through the U.S. amnesty program in 1986.
Martinez, a father of three, moved here in 2000.
During a 2004 visit to the makeshift memorial, he met Dora Torres, a 45-year-old illegal immigrant who lives in Houston.
Her youngest child – Jose Mauricio Torres, 15 – died in the trailer during a trip to live with her.
The dead were remembered May 17 this year during a special ceremony.
To honor the mother’s dead son, as well as those who die still today crossing the border, Martinez built a 400-pound solid concrete cross.
The cross bears the son’s name.
“The cross symbolizes a unity,” Martinez said in Spanish to Advocate interpreter Manuel De Los Santos. “God predicted that people should dominate the world, and not to have the world dominate the people.”
Martinez felt pride as he watched the Torres family embrace his gift. He also wanted passers-by to remember that people – not animals – died in that trailer.
“I believe everyone is God’s creatures,” he said. “All countries should provide work for their citizens.”
Greg Compean, 43, Houston
reg Compean helped officers from U.S. Homeland Security locate family members and identify the bodies.
In some cases, this process required months.
Compean owns Houston’s largest Hispanic funeral home.
After the tragedy, the 19 bodies were sent to Austin for autopsies. They then were sent to Compean. Because of the media circus, the bodies were delivered to him in disguised vehicles.
Compean knows about illegal immigration firsthand. He sees the death. He listens to the rhetoric.
“In the peak of a political season, the issue has become very controversial,” he said. “We don’t live in perfect world. This ain’t going to go away.”
Compean was born in the United States. His grandparents, though, migrated here two generations ago.
“My success now ... we didn’t start like this,” he said.
In Houston, Compean said he lives in a diverse subdivision surrounded by a mix of ethnicities: a Chinese family lives to his left; Italians, Greeks and others live nearby.
“What I like about it is my kids learn from diversity,” he said. “We can all learn from it.”
If any good comes from the tragedy, he said, he hopes the world becomes better educated. He understands Victoria sits at the front of the class.
“The immigrants are the faceless people of our country,” Compean said. “They go through the river, go through tractor-trailers, hide in boxes. If I want to get to the Valley, I have to go through Victoria. Ya’ll are right smack in the middle of it.”
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